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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26562592">An Unforeseen Future</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/MayorHaggar/pseuds/MayorHaggar'>MayorHaggar</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dune Series - Frank Herbert</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Anal Sex, Character Death, Come Swallowing, Creampie, Disfigurement, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, F/M, Femslash, Infidelity, Loss of Virginity, Multi, Oral Sex, Paddling, Polyamory, Rape/Non-con Elements, Rough Sex, Semi-Public Sex, Throne Sex, Verbal Humiliation, Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-04-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 09:47:58</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>120,817</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26562592</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/MayorHaggar/pseuds/MayorHaggar</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Chani leaves, stunning Paul, who had never seen this in any possible future. But the bigger shock will be Irulan’s once she says something to anger her suddenly solitary husband.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Irulan Corrino/Chani Kynes, Paul Atreides/Chani Kynes, Paul Atreides/Irulan Corrino</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>34</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>115</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. The Departure</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Devastation. Death. Massacre.</p><p>All of the things Paul had feared when he looked into the future and saw his Jihad were happening in the present. Despite his best efforts to use his prescience to make decisions that would avert that dark future, he'd set the galaxy on that path anyway. He'd seen death and instruction carried out in his name and under the Atreides banner, and try as he might to shake it, it had gone exactly as he'd feared. In deposing House Corrino and replacing Shaddam IV as the Emperor of known universe, Paul's Jihad had swept across planet after planet. His Fremen warriors had wrought devastation on the known universe in his name.</p><p>When Paul looked at what had been done in the last five years of Muad'Dib's Jihad, he recoiled in horror. He looked back on human history, all the way back to the Golden Age of Earth, and knew that he and his Jihad had carved out a special place of infamy. Whether comparing himself to figures like Caligula, Genghis Khan, Pal Pot or any other, he knew that this was the company he kept now. And Paul Muad'Dib was going to stand above them all. They'd all been restricted to the population of one planet, one world. His Jihad was washing over the universe, whether he wished it or not.</p><p>"We need to discuss the recent complaints issued by the Great Houses of the Landsraad," he said aloud, looking at his council. "They have demanded action be taken against the Bashar who was in charge of the massacre on Seprek."</p><p>Paul knew what action he wished to take. His Jihad had been bloody enough, but the reports that came in from Seprek were ghastly and gruesome enough to make even many of the most fervent Fremen uneasy. Though most alive would not have understood the references to Earth, in his own head Paul heard about the actions of his Fremen on Seprek and compared them to the Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day the Catholics launched against the Huguenots, or the Kristallnacht in Nazi Germany. It was not a thing Paul wished to have any part of, but it had happened and it had been done by his troops and under his banner.</p><p>Paul might have been unable to stop the Jihad, but he could at least do something about this. The Bashar named Haatim must be executed. Paul didn't want to declare this on his own though. It was important that he have his council's support in this. He wanted them to be behind this decision as well, and in the process perhaps they could prevent any massacres of this level from happening again, especially in his name. It would be a small victory when compared to the scope of his Jihad, but at least it would be something.</p><p>"I do not believe we should listen to the Landsraad's calls for blood," Korba said. "We have heard the words of Haatim. He has sworn that much of the brutality committed on Seprek was not done on his command, and instead it was the commanders beneath him who are at fault. He has insisted the commanders acted on their own authority, and he did not wish for such brutality to be done under his watch."</p><p>"And you believe him?" Stilgar asked. His old friend was stoic, but Paul could read him easily. Stilgar did not believe Haatim's claims any more than Paul did. Paul believed that the man was only trying to claim insubordination to save his own skin, and Stilgar seemed to be of a similar mind.</p><p>"I do," Korba said, nodding. "He has been an effective Bashar, has he not? And nothing of this sort has ever occurred under his command before. Plus we must remember that he is the nephew of Imam." Stilgar nodded in concession of the point. Imam was the leader of his own sietch, and that was not to be discounted.</p><p>"And what punishment would you propose, Korba?" Paul asked. Privately he wondered whether Korba actually believed Haatim or if he had other motives for suggesting a lighter punishment, but he held his own counsel for the time being.</p><p>"Even if you choose not to believe his words, executing him would upset the Naibs," Korba insisted, likely correctly. "Rather than execution, he should be discharged from the Fedaykin and sent into exile back in Imam's sietch."</p><p>"The Landsraad would never accept such a light punishment," Alia said, shaking her head. Paul agreed, and from the nods he saw around the table it was obvious that the rest of the council saw it too. Korba didn't look pleased at the challenge, especially from a child, but Alia was no child, not in truth. Her body might only be nine years old, but she had more knowledge and experience in her head than anyone else Paul could turn to thanks to the awakening she'd undergone while in their mother's womb. Others looked at her oddly and the Bene Gesserit called her Abomination, but Paul was glad for his sister's presence.</p><p>"The Landsraad do not rule the Fremen," Korba said. "Muad'Dib rules the Fremen, and the Fremen answer only to Muad'Dib."</p><p>"We must respond to Haatim's actions in a way that both the Landsraad and the Naibs can find acceptable," Paul's concubine Chani said. She was concubine in name only, of course. All knew that she was the woman he held his heart.</p><p>"And how do we do that?" Korba asked, clearly not believing such a thing was possible. He was right that it was a difficult balance to strike, and even Paul had his doubts, but if his Sihaya could come up with something he would certainly listen.</p><p>"The Bashar Haatim should be blinded," Chani said. "This would not be a public execution, but once blinded Haatim would be bound by his honor as a Fremen to go into the desert and let himself be consumed by Shai-Hulud."</p><p>Paul could see that Stilgar looked sympathetic to the idea, and somewhat more surprising to him was that Alia was nodding thoughtfully as well. He understood Chani's thinking, but as much as Paul loved and respected his Sihaya, he could not agree. A blind Fremen was expected to offer himself up to Shai-Hulud. The Naibs might see this as a fitting and just punishment, but the Landsraad would not agree. Still Paul remained silent. He wanted to see what the rest of the council thought of this before he voiced his own views.</p><p>"This is still much too lenient," Irulan objected. "Giving his water to the desert might be acceptable to the Fremen Naibs, but it won't be enough for the Landsraad, nor should it be." Paul let nothing show, but privately he found himself agreeing with the woman who was his wife in name if not in practice. "Haatim is a war criminal, and should be treated as such under the laws of the Imperium of which Arrakis is part."</p><p>"And then the Naibs are upset," Stilgar stated, returning them to the initial problem.</p><p>"Yes, they are," Irulan agreed before shrugging her shoulders. "But if we are to be not just part of the Imperium but in control of it, we must put doing the just thing above trying to appease the Naibs. I agree with the Landsraad; what Haatim did is unforgiveable." She looked over at Chani directly next. "And even if he is blinded, what's to stop Haatim from simply refusing to go into the desert, buying artificial eyes off of the Bene Tleilaxu, and retiring somewhere off world in comfort?"</p><p>"It is not the Fremen way," Stilgar said, frowning.</p><p>"And you are not Fremen," Chani added. "You would not understand."</p><p>"Perhaps I don't," Irulan said. "But I <em>do</em> understand that Haatim has a history of behaving dishonorably even before his actions on Seprek. Admirable as the true Fremen way might be, I see no reason to trust that Haatim would adhere to those ways."</p><p>Paul found himself in full agreement with his wife, which wasn't a familiar position for him. It was doubly true when it came to a disagreement between her and Chani, the woman who held his heart and was his true wife in his heart even if she didn't hold the title. He didn't merely agree with her position but as also impressed by her arguments themselves. She was making good points, and those same points made by someone else may well have swayed the majority of the council into her way of thinking (and the way of thinking Paul wished them to reach.)</p><p>Unfortunately it was Irulan making the arguments, and the council was not likely to take her seriously. Everyone else on Paul's council disliked Irulan, with the exception of Chani who pitied her more than anything.</p><p>"I'm sure we all appreciate the input of Muad'Dib's <em>wife</em>," Korba said, drawing out the last word in an obvious mockery of the woman who they all knew enjoyed no such closeness with Paul. "But when it comes to the discipline of a Bashar, there may be some of us who have more wisdom to offer."</p><p>“Maybe you can lead these discussions when it’s time to talk about how to build a successful marriage,” Alia added, much to Irulan’s displeasure. Paul wasn’t happy about it either, though it was less for the personal insult to his wife and more because it effectively killed whatever slim chance that still remained for Irulan to sway the council. He did not let it show on his face, however, and he comforted himself with the knowledge that there would soon be another chance to see justice done, and the second one would have a far greater likelihood of success.</p><p>Yes, this council may have gone very differently if it had been someone other than Irulan making what Paul believed to be very valid arguments. Had her words come from another’s lips, he may have been able to proceed as planned right away. Not all was lost, however. Paul knew that Gurney Halleck was due to arrive on Arrakis within the week, and knowing his old teacher and Warmaster as he did, Paul felt confident that Gurney would offer the same counsel that Irulan just had. The difference was that Gurney held the respect of everyone on the council, and they knew he had Paul’s respect and trust as well. When Gurney pushed for them to execute Haatim as a war criminal, the council would listen.</p><p>“It seems we won’t be coming to an agreement today,” Paul said. “I believe we should adjourn this matter until our next council meeting.”</p><p>“The Landsraad and the Fremen Naibs will both get impatient before long,” Chani said. “We shouldn’t delay for long.”</p><p>“Not long, no,” Paul agreed, “but we shouldn’t rush into a mistake either. I think we can afford to take a few days to think it over. Some time to think should help us reach the proper decision.” As would the arrival of Gurney, though Paul didn’t voice his true reason for delaying a decision.</p><p>--</p><p>“I want to talk to you about Irulan.”</p><p>“Oh?” Paul looked up at Chani with interest. “Is this about our council a few hours ago? We don’t need to worry about that for now, beloved.” He wasn’t used to being at odds with Chani, and had no interest in exploring that any more right now. He had no real desire to discuss it with anyone for that matter. He would much rather let the issue of what to do with Haatim rest until Gurney arrived.</p><p>“It’s because of that, but not truly,” she said. “It’s more about something it made me feel.”</p><p>“And what’s that?” he asked.</p><p>“Pity,” Chani said. “I might not have agreed with the argument she was making, but I felt bad for her with the way everyone attacked and piled on. She doesn’t have a true friend in this place.”</p><p>“No,” he said simply. There was no denying that. As far as he was aware there wasn’t a single person on Arrakis who Irulan could count as a friend or confidant. He had given her permission to take a lover since he had no intention of ever touching her, with the only caveat being that she could not under any circumstances get pregnant since that would create issues with his succession. If she’d actually taken him up on that offer, she’d done an exceptionally good job of being circumspect about it. There certainly hadn’t been any sign of a male companion around her, and he hadn’t heard even the hint of a whisper of rumor surrounding her fidelity.</p><p>“Did you have a solution in mind?”      </p><p>“I was thinking she might feel less lonely if she had a friend of her own in the palace. Perhaps you could invite one of her sisters to come here and join her at court?”</p><p>“I can do that,” Paul said, nodding. “I will bring it up with Irulan.”</p><p>It was a sensible suggestion. Obviously it would need to be one of her two sisters who were still unmarried as of yet. Shaddam IV’s second eldest daughter, Chalice, had died under rather mysterious and suspect circumstances two years earlier, which left Wensicia as his heir. That one was too ambitious for her own good, but she’d recently gotten married to some cousin of Count Fenring. This left Irulan’s two youngest sisters, Josifa and Rugi, unmarried. Either of them would make a good companion for Irulan on an otherwise unfriendly planet. </p><p>“Good,” Chani said, smiling slightly. “It would do her good to have someone here to talk to. Maybe having a friend on hand to speak with will help soften the blow of having her ideas rejected in council. I don’t like seeing her humiliated, even if her ideas deserve to be rejected.”</p><p>Paul said nothing. He didn’t want to argue the point with his beloved, but he wasn’t going to lie to her either and pretend that he was against Irulan’s suggestion. She would know his true feelings when he supported the argument he was sure Gurney would make, but even if he didn’t anticipate the incoming support of his old teacher he still would prefer not to tell lies to his Sihaya if at all possible.</p><p>“Usul?” Chani said, frowning at him. “You <em>do</em> agree with me that Irulan’s arguments are wrong, don’t you?” Whether she’d seen the apprehension on his face or was just inferring something from his silence, Chani realized that something was amiss. Paul sighed, realizing he would need to give her an answer now.</p><p>At first he considered giving her some kind of platitude, a mysterious answer that did not reveal his true thoughts about what should be done with the war criminal one way or the other. But he decided against it. Keeping his own counsel with the others was prudent. Even Alia; she was his sister, but there were times he thought her to be the most dangerous person he knew. But if he could not be honest with Chani, his beloved, who <em>could</em> he be honest with?</p><p>“I do not,” he said, making his decision and choosing to be honest with her. “Though I did not say so, I think Irulan had the right of it. Haatim needs to be executed. It is the proper thing.”</p><p>“The proper thing for the Landsraad, maybe,” Chani said. Her frown was even deeper now, and he didn’t like what it did to her cute elfin face. “But Haatim is Fremen, as are you. He should be punished in a Fremen way.”</p><p>“He’s not <em>just</em> Fremen, but also a member of the Imperium,” Paul said. “Irulan was right when she called him a war criminal. You heard the reports just as I did, Sihaya. I know they had to turn your stomach just as surely as they turned mine.”</p><p>“They did,” Chani agreed, “and he should be punished for them. But he is Fremen, and he was a Fedaykin. He doesn’t deserve to be executed in the way an offworlder would be executed. He should give his water to Shai-Hulud. Is it not fitting? He deserves to be treated as Fremen, and he will die just as surely as he would if the Landsraad got their way. What is the problem, Usul? You are Fremen just as much as any of us. You should see that Irulan’s way is wrong.”</p><p>“I became Usul, and later Muad’Dib,” Paul said quietly. “But I was once an offworlder too, just like Irulan. Do you think me believing that she is right about Haatim makes me less of a Fremen?”</p><p>“Do not put words in my mouth,” Chani said, shaking her head. “You are still my Usul, but maybe you’ve forgotten that. Maybe you’ve been in Arrakeen too long. Maybe we both have.” Before she had been upset, but now she actually looked angry. Paul was disconcerted about the turn this conversation was taking, but much like with his Jihad, he felt powerless to stop it now.</p><p>“And what does that mean?” he asked. “Do you disagree with the changes I’ve made to Arrakis? Do you regret leaving the desert behind?”</p><p>It was a question he was almost afraid to even ask, let alone hear the answer to. He’d done what he had to do, but there were definitely times that he wished he could go back to his life before he’d defeated Shaddam IV and become Muad’Dib. He’d been able to give this barren desert planet water; he’d remade it into something else entirely, swiftly transforming it into something Chani’s father Liet Kynes had hoped to accomplish only with generation upon generation upon generation of work. But he wondered what Liet Kynes would think of the world he’d created, and the changes it had brought on the universe and on the people of Arrakis. Would he approve, or would he look at the new Fremen who took the abundance of water for granted and shake his head in disgust?</p><p>“I do not regret going where you go, Usul,” Chani said. “But maybe I should be asking that question to you. Do you regret becoming Emperor?” She looked nervous before she asked her next question. “Or is it me that you regret?”</p><p>“What?” It wasn’t often that Paul was legitimately shocked, not with his powers of prescience, but those were not words he ever expected to come out of Chani’s mouth. “How can you even ask a question like that? Why would you ever doubt my love for you, Sihaya?”</p><p>“I do not doubt your love,” she said, but the troubled look on her face did not allow the pressure on his heart to ease. “But you are an emperor, and you need an heir. I have not given you one. Maybe you side with Irulan because you are softening, and you think she can give you what I cannot.”</p><p>Paul closed his eyes for a moment. He knew that her failure to get pregnant again weighed on Chani. She had badly wanted to give him a child, but she did not know what he knew. One of the dangers of prescience was the secrets that must be kept, and he must never tell Chani what he had seen in her future should she get pregnant again. If only their first child, years dead now, had not been killed by Beast Rabban! Leto II had been taken before his time just like his eponym, and his loss was a wound still felt by Chani to this day. He knew she wanted another child with him, but he feared the future he had seen should that be allowed to happen. That was why he had not acted to stop Irulan from spiking Chani’s food with contraceptives. His Sihaya would be so angry with him if she knew that he had allowed this to happen, that he had stood back and done nothing, allowing Irulan’s scheme to succeed because he feared what would happen if it <em>didn’t</em> succeed.</p><p>“I swore that I would never touch Irulan,” he said, “and for five years I have kept my promise. For five years she has been my wife but has never experienced the slightest intimacy, at least not with me. Do you really think that me agreeing with her about Haatim means she is some kind of threat to you?”</p><p>“I do not know what to think,” Chani said after a pause. Her eyes were troubled. “But I know that things are changing. <em>You</em> are changing, and in ways I don’t recognize.”       </p><p>What could Paul say to that? It wasn't like he could disagree and tell her that she was wrong, that he was the same person that he'd always been. He <em>was</em> changing; the entire universe was changing. His Jihad was seeing to that. Of course he was changing. How could he pretend otherwise?</p><p>"Many things have changed, and many things will change," he said. "One thing that has not is my love for you. Trust in that, if nothing else."</p><p>"I do believe that you love me," she said. Just when he began to relax Chani closed her eyes, and his body felt inexplicably cold when she opened them. He did not recognize the look that he saw there. "But I don't recognize who you're becoming. Are you my Usul, or are you the Duke's son, the offworlder who behaves as the Landsraad wants him to? Do you love me and wish to have children with me, or are you wavering and considering breeding with your wife instead?"</p><p>Paul again wanted to insist that it was her that he wanted, that he had no interest in lying with his wife no matter how beautiful she was. But he could see that no words would reach her in that moment. There was nothing he could say to her to ease her troubles, especially since he knew the cause of her infertility that was at the heart of her doubts and had done nothing to stop it. Any platitudes or assurances from him would have been wasted.</p><p>In all the years they had been together, this was the first proper argument he'd ever had with Chani. They'd had disagreements of course, but none had ever been this serious. Paul was dismayed and at a loss on what to do or say. This was not a future he had seen, and Paul felt as blind and lost as any other human would have.</p><p>"What would you have me say?" he asked. "Do you want me to support your suggestion on what to do with Haatim? I will do so if it will ease your doubts. Tell me what to do and I will do it, Sihaya." It felt strange for him to beseech someone else to tell him what to do. He was the one with the prescience; he was the one who had transformed Arrakis beyond recognition. He was Muad'Dib, the one that the universe looked to for answers, yet in this he was clueless.</p><p>"I don't think there is anything to be said," Chani said, her eyes sad. She did not cry; she was still Fremen, and true Fremen did not waste water. "Not right now, at least. I think what we both need is time away from each other."  </p><p>"Away?" he whispered, stricken.</p><p>"Away," she said, nodding with a grimace. "I think I'll go to the south for a few weeks, at least. That should give us both time to think."</p><p>The discussion seemed to be at an end, and Paul did not know what to say. He felt stunned, genuinely stunned, for the first time in years. He'd thought the universe held no true surprises anymore for one such as him, but this was not something he had seen in any possible future.</p><p>There had been death and tragedy in many of the futures he'd witnessed, but in every single one of them Chani had been by his side.</p><p>--</p><p>Paul could read Gurney's face and body language and know what his answer would be before he ever opened his mouth.</p><p>"Haatim must be executed," Gurney said. He went on to make arguments that were functionally the same as those Irulan had made a week earlier, though this time the council listened. There was still opposition from Korba, who would not be swayed, but the majority of the council swung to Gurney's line of thinking and agreed that Haatim would be publicly executed the very next day. They would have been able to achieve a majority even with full attendance, but Gurney's proposal had even less resistance than it likely would have if Chani were there. Paul looked at the empty seat that should have been hers and frowned.</p><p>His mood had been sour for the last week, and while Chani's absence obviously was at the heart of it, there was something else there too. He couldn't quite put his finger on what it was, but there was something bothering him beyond just the absence of his beloved. He participated in the council meeting and supported the decision to execute Haatim the next day, but his mind was elsewhere.</p><p>Attempting to figure out what to do about Chani would have to wait. She would return on her own time and when she was ready, and that was if she returned at all. Paul believed she would, but he had never thought for a second that she would leave to begin with. No future he'd seen had ever shown him a glimpse of Chani leaving him for any length of time, so how could he say with any certainty that she would return?</p><p>He had a feeling that whatever else it was that was bothering him was something closer to him, something he would hopefully be able to identify and resolve more immediately. That would be welcome; he was feeling lost without Chani there, his prescience seemingly useless if it couldn't even warn him that the woman he loved would leave his side. Taking care of whatever this other issue was would be a good way for him to feel like he still had some control over his life, never mind his empire.</p><p>Paul saw Irulan stand up to leave, looking less pleased than he might have thought she would since the council had come around to her position in the end. It was likely that any sense of personal accomplishment she might have otherwise had was muted by the reality that it had taken someone else making the same basic argument to actually get the council. It didn't matter how sound her arguments were if she had no friends and supporters and no one on the council respected her enough to take what she said seriously.</p><p>Remembering Chani's suggestion, the innocent suggestion that had come before his entire world was upended, Paul decided to put it into action. His beloved may not be here at the moment to see him follow through, but that didn't make the suggestion any less prudent.</p><p>"Irulan, could you stay behind for a moment?" he asked. "There's something I'd like to discuss with you." She looked towards him in surprise, but nodded her head.</p><p>"If you'd like," she said, shrugging. She stayed on her feet but made no move to the door. Everyone else on the council was interested in him asking her to remain behind, which was no real surprise. It wasn't common for him to ask to speak to her privately as it was, and doing so while Chani was noticeably not present was bound to raise some eyebrows. Some like Stilgar and Gurney did a reasonable job of hiding it, but others like Alia and Korba were rather obvious in their interest. Paul met his little sister's stare until she finally left the room and he and his wife were alone.     </p><p>"So what is it?" Irulan asked. "What do you need from me?"</p><p>"Me? I don't need anything from you," he said. "I actually asked you to stay behind so I could make a suggestion. It's no secret that you don't have many friends here at court." Irulan smirked slightly, which he assumed was because this was actually an understatement. "I was thinking you might feel more comfortable here in Arrakeen if you had a friendly face to spend your time with. Perhaps you could invite one of your unmarried sisters to join you? We would welcome either Josifa or Rugi."</p><p>"Hmm. I'll consider it," Irulan said, to Paul's mild surprise. He wasn't sure what reaction he'd been expecting from her. He hadn't thought she would burst into tears or thank him for his thoughtfulness or anything of the sort, but it seemed reasonable that she would perk up at least slightly at the thought of having one of her sisters join her here in Arrakeen, where she had no one she could really call a friend as far as he knew.</p><p>"Is that all, or did you need something else?" she asked. Paul, realizing he would get no greater reaction than that, shook his head.</p><p>"No, that's it," he said. "You can go now." She nodded at him and walked away without another word. His eyes instinctively were drawn to her prominent behind swishing underneath her skirts as she left. It wasn't the first time he'd taken note of her large bottom, and of course he was aware of her massive breasts. But where before he had noted these things clinically and without much interest, his eyes remained on her rear this time longer than they ever had before. Perhaps Chani no longer being beside him in his bed was affecting him more than he'd realized.</p><p>Paul felt disconcerted by the conversation, which had not gone the way he had expected it to. As he left the now empty council room and made his way back to his own chambers, he finally realized what the other thing bothering him was, the thing that had been niggling in the back of his brain for the last week. It was Irulan.</p><p>More specifically, it was Irulan's avoidance and lack of interest in speaking with him over the last week that gave him pause. It wasn't that he was arrogant or desired her attention, but it made no sense that she would avoid him. This was the perfect chance for her. Everyone knew that Chani had left a week ago, and that he had not been happy about it. There had never been a better opportunity for her to try and convince him to have a child with her, something she'd frequently attempted to do over the past five years.</p><p>The only man she’d ever shown any interest in bedding was him, and that was just because she wanted to do her duty as his wife and give birth to an Atreides child, just as her masters the Bene Gesserit planned. Their generations of careful breeding to achieve their Kwisatz Haderach had been upended by his mother the Lady Jessica’s decision to give her love Leto the son he desired instead of the daughter the witches of the Bene Gesserit commanded her to.</p><p>Paul had been the result. He possessed the power of the Kwisatz Haderach that they'd been carefully breeding for 10 thousand years, but their original plan of breeding an Atreides daughter to a Harkonnen son had been subverted by his mother's decision.  Irulan was their chance to get things back on the path they desired by breeding with Paul and giving birth to his child, but in order to do that she would have to get him to touch her. She'd attempted to do so for five years without success because of his love for Chani. With Chani gone this was the best chance Irulan had ever had to try and tempt him into giving her what she and the Bene Gesserit wanted, but she had not made even the slightest of attempts to initiate anything with him.</p><p>What game was she playing?</p><p>--</p><p>Another week had followed. Haatim had been executed as planned, to the satisfaction of the Landsraad and the disapproval of at least some of the Fremen Naibs. But for Paul it had been a week of frustration and confusion. There had been no word from Chani, not that he'd expected any. There had also been no attempt from Irulan to entice him into bed, to appeal to his need to breed and produce heirs for the good of the Imperium or even to speak with him. It was this that truly gave Paul pause. The silence from Chani was something he'd expected and had resigned himself to, but the continued inaction from Irulan puzzled him.</p><p>He was done waiting. He was going to confront Irulan and figure out what she was and was not doing. That was why his feet carried him to her chambers one day after his other responsibilities had been taken care of. It was time to get to the bottom of this.</p><p>"Irulan? May I enter?"</p><p>"You may," her voice called from behind the closed door. She did not look up when he entered, but instead remained seated and bent over her desk, staring down and focusing on her scribbling. He did not need to ask what she was writing; her histories had been her primary focus for years.</p><p>"I'd like to ask you something," he said. He waited for her to look up, but she didn't.</p><p>"Ask it, then," she said after a pause in which they were both silent. She continued to write, going on with her histories as if speaking with him was an inconvenience that would soon disappear.</p><p>"Will you look at me?" he asked, getting annoyed now.</p><p>"I don't see why I should need to," she said, and even now she refused to quit writing. "I'm perfectly capable of asking your question while continuing on with my work."</p><p>"What game are you playing?"  He was going to forego dancing around the issue and get straight to the point.</p><p>"Game?" she repeated. "What game? I'm writing, as you can see."</p><p>"That's not what I mean. Why have you avoided me for the past two weeks? After five years of trying to convince me to have a child with you, why have you made no attempt over the past two weeks? Without Chani here, you have never had a more opportune moment."</p><p>Irulan sighed and put her writing utensil down, pausing her writing at last. She stood up from her chair and turned to look at him. "You're right. With Chani gone, this would have been a perfect opportunity for me to swoop in and try to convince you to give me a child. But I no longer want to have a child with you, husband or not."</p><p>"You don't?" Of all the potential explanations Paul had foreseen, this was not one of them. He'd been sure that she was just playing an elaborate game with him, but could she be telling the truth? Had she really given up on having his child, now of all times? "Why?"</p><p>"Why?" Irulan looked at him like she thought he was quite stupid, which was not an expression he was used to seeing on people's faces anymore. "Because you're a cruel and abusive husband, as well as a tyrant."</p><p>"I'm no more a tyrant than your father was," he said. "It was him who put all of this into motion by conspiring with the Harkonnens to eradicate my family. My father was an honorable man who had earned the loyalty of his people and the respect of the other families in the Landsraad, and because of that your insecure father considered him a threat and had him removed. He tried to do the same to me, but we know how well that worked out for him. I’m here, and he’s in exile." Irulan scowled at the slight to her father, but it was true and they both knew it. "And how have I been cruel or abusive to you? You have a place on my council, and I've given you permission to take a lover if that is your desire."</p><p>“Yes, how charitable of you!” she spat. “You’ve given me permission to sleep with another man, but never to love one openly! I can never actually have children, with you or with anyone else! How magnanimous of you!”</p><p>“You know why I cannot permit you to bear a child with another man,” he said with forced calm. “You, your family and the Bene Gesserit would attempt to pass the child off as mine. And you also know why I cannot and will not impregnate you myself. You may be my wife, but Chani is my love. I have made a vow to remain faithful to her.”</p><p>“And how well is that working out for you?” she asked, glaring at him. “You can be as faithful as you like to Chani, but you still managed to chase her off, didn’t you? And it’s been five years and she’s just as childless as I am. Maybe I’m the lucky one after all. At least I’ve already accepted you as the bastard you are. She’s only just now realized that you’ll never be able to give her what she wants.”</p><p>Paul could have called her out on the contraceptives she was sneaking into Chani’s food to make sure she didn’t get pregnant. Given that they’d had a child before ever meeting Irulan, he knew he and Chani were both perfectly capable of producing a child. Without Irulan’s interference Chani would have surely gotten pregnant at some point over the last five years. But pointing this out would reveal to her that he had been fully aware of what she was doing and had not moved to stop it, and that would lead to her, and by extension the witches of the Bene Gesserit, asking questions about <em>why</em> he’d done nothing to stop her scheme. Those were not questions he wanted to answer, or even to put in their heads.</p><p>“You do not like me,” he said, to which she laughed without humor. “That does not bother me. I can’t say I like you all that much either. You’re not only the daughter of the man who conspired to kill my father and most of the loyal men who followed him here to Arrakis, and nearly succeeded in doing the same to me and my mother, but you’re also a Bene Gesserit witch. You are doubly damned in my eyes. And yet I have made no attempt to harm you. We will never have a loving marriage or children, but I have never punished you or treated you abusively despite what your family did to mine. You think me cruel because I won’t touch you or permit you to love another man openly and give him children, but I could have been much crueler to you. Hate me if you like, but I’m kinder to you than I could have been.”</p><p>“Oh, spare me your preaching! I’m not one of your fanatical Fremen willing to slaughter billions in the name of Muad’Dib’s <em>peace.</em> I would have rather married Beast Rabban than you!”</p><p>“I find that difficult to believe,” he said. “Unless you haven’t heard the stories of what happened to the women unlucky enough to have caught the eye of that brute.” Beast Rabban had been a violent terror, even by Harkonnen standards. Arrakis, and the universe as a whole, was much better off with him dead.</p><p>“I know all about his reputation,” Irulan said, shaking her head. “And yes, I would still have preferred him to you. The vicious beatings and violent rapes I would have endured as Beast Rabban’s wife would still have been preferable to Muad’Dib’s <em>kindness.</em> At least he would have actually bothered to acknowledge my presence. And at least he would have given me children. Even if I would have despised him, at least I would have been able to live my life for the children I would have given him. Not so with you, <em>husband</em>. You’re content to let me remain a virgin bride forever, never to have children, never to know a man’s touch. So yes, Paul, I would prefer him to you.”</p><p>Paul was stunned as he listened to her earnestly insist that she would prefer Beast Rabban to him, and then it switched to annoyance as well as anger. The comparison to Beast Rabban was particularly angering to him. The old baron Harkonnen’s nephew hadn’t just treated his women (and his enemies, and people in general) brutally, but was also responsible for the murder of Paul’s infant son. He wasn’t sure Irulan could have made a less flattering comparison if she’d tried.</p><p>“Does that upset you, husband?” Irulan asked. She’d been able to see how much it had upset him, and it gave her some perverse sense of amusement. His beautiful wife smirked at him, and he’d never seen such malice displayed in a mockery of a smile. He turned on his heel and marched towards the door of her chambers, not wanting to explode on her or reveal just how much she’d angered him. “That’s right, turn and run!” she shouted at him as he walked out. “Run, just like your precious Chani did!”</p><p>Paul heard the sound of Irulan smashing a couple of ornamental baubles into pieces against the wall as he left and closed the door behind him.</p><p>He did not linger long enough to hear her begin to sob.</p><p>--</p><p>Paul’s anger had not cooled when he returned to his own chambers. He actually just continued to grow angrier over the next several hours as he privately mused over his wife’s words.</p><p>He knew his anger was not solely down to the unpleasant conversation he’d had with Irulan. He had already been miserable and frustrated and lost without Chani as the comforting presence at his side that she’d been for years. Irulan’s nastiness towards him had just been the thing to push him over the edge.</p><p>Paul knew he was thinking irrationally as he left his chambers and made his way back towards Irulan’s, but between Chani’s departure and Irulan’s insults he was too far gone to care. He had decided to teach his wife the foolishness of her words. If she was so insistent on a physically abusive marriage being preferable to a chaste and loveless marriage where she was ignored, he was going to show her how misguided she was. She was going to wish she could go back to the days of simply being ignored by her husband!</p><p>He did not knock or announce his presence when he arrived at Irulan’s chambers this time. He simply forced the door open, stepped inside and closed it behind him. She looked up, startled at the unannounced intrusion, and her green eyes grew stormy when she saw him.</p><p>“We have nothing more to discuss, husband,” she seethed. “Leave at once!”</p><p>“No,” he said simply, shaking his head and walking towards her. She took a few quick steps back, and he noted her eyes darting around to look at her surroundings. She was a Bene Gesserit; she’d been trained in how to defend herself against threats. He wasn’t worried though. “You are right about us not having anything more to discuss. Instead I’m going to show you the folly of your words.”</p><p>With nothing within reach that she could grab to defend herself, she had to resort to physically trying to fend him off. She was tall for a woman, and far more dangerous and capable than most, but she was no match for him. She resisted, but he had little trouble restraining her.</p><p>“Let me go!” she shouted. She tried to struggle out of his grip, but to no avail. She was going nowhere.</p><p>“No, I don’t think I will,” he said. “You say that you would prefer an abusive marriage to a chaste one where you’re ignored? Let’s find out how true that actually is.”</p><p>It was more than just anger and vindictiveness that motivated Paul now. Lust was another factor. Irulan was a beautiful woman, but calling her merely beautiful honestly did not do her justice. Generations of the carefully selective Bene Gesserit breeding program showed up in her. Before he’d merely noted her beauty without thinking much on it; he’d been committed to Chani and had no interest in Irulan no matter how beautiful she was. Everything was different now though. Chani was gone, possibly never to return for all he and his prescience had seen. She was the only woman he’d ever known in his life, but that would about to change.</p><p>Her curses were cut off as he put his mouth over hers and kissed her lips, claiming her mouth forcefully and not showing her an ounce of the gentle passion he’d so often used to kiss Chani. Irulan was still wearing the same expensive green dress she’d been wearing the first time he visited her chambers hours earlier, and he reached up to grope her breasts through that dress.</p><p>Paul had not been alone in noticing Irulan’s massive chest, but as he roughly squeezed her breasts through her dress it dawned on him that he was more than likely the first person to ever touch her in this way. It gave him a perverse sort of pleasure to know that, assuming it was true that she had never taken him up on his offer to discreetly take on a lover.</p><p>The lovely golden haired princess squirmed in his grasp, but she was going nowhere. When his hands left her chest it was only so he could move them around to the other side of her body and grope her ass instead. Her ass was large and shapely as well. He hadn’t been able to help admiring that ass swishing as she walked away from him, but now he was going beyond admiring it and was cupping it, groping it, squeezing it as a lover might have, at least if he was unafraid to claim this princess as his. He wasn’t her lover, but he <em>was</em> going to claim her as his. She was already his in a sense; she had been his wife for five years now. But now, for the first time, he was going to treat her more as a husband would a wife.               </p><p>He had never grabbed a woman’s rear so firmly or shoved his tongue into their mouth so forcefully. It wasn’t merely the absence of Chani that triggered this side of him. It wasn’t as if he’d never felt the urge to act so roughly before, but with Chani he’d always held back. He loved her too much to ask her or force her to fulfill the rougher of his sexual desires, and so he’d always held back. She was his Sihaya, his beloved, his true mate even if she did not hold the title of wife.</p><p>Irulan <em>did</em> hold that title, but that was all that she held. He did not love her, did not even like her very much, and at the moment he was feeling particularly wroth with her. She would be a perfect source on which he could finally fulfill some of those desires that he’d held for years but had not allowed himself to express. She would make a perfect fuck toy.</p><p>“You’re going to wish I’d continued to ignore you by the time I’m through,” he promised, breaking away from her lips to nip at her shoulder. She groaned and squirmed, but that was all she was capable of doing.</p><p>“I wonder if you really have remained virginal all this time,” he said, continuing to squeeze her large ass in both hands.</p><p>“Of course I have!” she said angrily. “You saw to that!”</p><p>“Let’s find out if you’re telling the truth, or if you’ve been lying to me and only pretending that you haven’t taken on a lover.” He wasn’t sure which answer he would prefer. He wouldn’t be angry if she’d taken on a lover; he’d given her his permission to do so, after all. But he thought it might be fun to taunt her for her hypocrisy if she’d professed her chastity while knowing it was a lie.</p><p>He certainly wasn’t going to take her at her word. He pushed her down onto her own bed and hiked up the skirts of her fancy dress. Paul was pleased to see that she was wearing only a pair of expensive-looking green silk underwear underneath the dress. That would make what he was about to do much easier.</p><p>Paul reached underneath her dress and grabbed onto the silk panties with both hands. Despite her squirming, it would have been easy enough for him to pull her underwear off of her body without incident. But he wasn’t in the mood to do anything simply or without incident. When removing them, he yanked on her panties so hard that they tore. She gasped at the boorish nature with which he was handling her, but he could not have cared less about her shock. He held her legs open and got down between them so he could perform his examination.  </p><p>“What are you doing?!” she screeched. “Get away from there!”</p><p>“But I have to see whether or not you’re telling the truth, wife,” he said. He spread her open and went about doing exactly that. He couldn’t trust her to tell the truth, obviously, so he would just have to see for himself whether or not she was still virginal.</p><p>“Well look at that,” he said, smiling as his examination came across undeniable proof that she had indeed never known a lover, or at the very least had never known a lover who she went all the way and consummated her relationship with. Her maidenhead was still intact. “You’re still virginal after all, princess.”</p><p>“Of course I am!” she said. “And now that you’ve humiliated me <em>and</em> proven what a vile man you actually are, get the hell out of my chambers and leave me alone!”</p><p>“Oh, I won’t be doing that,” he said, shaking his head. “You have made it very clear to me that nothing could be worse than ignoring you. You yourself said that you would prefer to be used and abused rather than left alone. I can only apologize for failing you these last five years, wife. I’d thought you would be happier if I left you to your own devices and allowed you to take your own lover if that was your wish, but you’ve let me know how wrong I was. While I cannot make up for the last five years of neglect, I <em>can</em> do my best to make sure your needs are met, starting right now.”</p><p>Paul rolled his wife over onto her stomach and hiked up her skirt again. From this side he gained an even greater appreciation for her ass. It was round and perfect, and though he hated himself for the mental comparison to Chani, he would be lying if he said it wasn’t the nicest ass he’d ever seen.</p><p>And now he was going to abuse it. And he was going to use something of hers to do it.</p><p>Irulan hissed in surprise the first time that the hairbrush smacked her bottom, but she quickly schooled her emotions and did her best not to show any significant reaction as he continued to swat her behind. She likely had realized that screaming or calling for help would do her no good. No one would lift a finger to stop this, both because she was his wife and because she had no friends here. Accepting that she would need to endure it, she had apparently decided to use her Bene Gesserit training to control her reactions and try to deny him the satisfaction. She was welcome to try, but Paul was going to show her the folly of believing pain was preferable to solitude either way.</p><p>There was a bit of irony in not only using her own words against her, but using her own hairbrush to do it. Up until now this had been a tool used to groom her long golden hair, but he doubted she would ever be able to look at it the same way after this. She'd never be able to hold this brush in her hand again without remembering him paddling her ass with it.</p><p>He was going all out to make sure she would never forget this paddling too. He'd always been gentle and loving with Chani, but there was none of that here. This was him unleashing a darker side of himself on a lover (or a sex partner, more fittingly, since there was no love between him and his wife) for the first time, and it was something he found himself warming up to quite quickly. He brought the hairbrush down on both of Irulan's prominent cheeks again and again, giving her a harsh and swift paddling that would leave her ass red and sore long after he was done.</p><p>Paul looked at the marks he'd left with satisfaction once he finally paused in his paddling and set the brush aside. Irulan betrayed herself with a quiet sigh of relief at an end to her spanking, but if she thought the worst was over she was about to learn how mistaken she was.</p><p>"You put your mouth to use earlier by insulting me," he said. "Now I'd like to see you use it in a manner more befitting your place here. Suck my cock, and let's see how well the Bene Gesserit taught you."</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan's eyes widened when Paul's pants were off and his cock was free. She was indeed a virgin, as her husband could now attest, but she was far from ignorant in the ways of sex. The Bene Gesserit would not have permitted such, considering it was their goal to control and manipulate the powerful nobles of the known universe through sex. Her sexual education had been very thorough, as it was for all Bene Gesserit. She had extensive knowledge on how things worked and what she could do to draw men's attention and give them pleasure that would bring them to their knees. After years of trying to entice him she had resigned herself to never actually putting those lessons to use on Paul, who had made it very clear that he would never touch her and would forever remain faithful to his royal concubine Chani.</p><p>All of that had changed tonight. Paul was not only going back on his vow of faithfulness to his Fremen lover but was apparently going to sample Irulan's skills and test her Bene Gesserit knowledge and training whether she wished him to or not, and there was nothing she could do about it and no one she could turn to for help. Even the other members of the Bene Gesserit would not be sympathetic if she told them he had forced himself on her. They would remind her that the entire purpose behind her marrying Paul was to birth his children and salvage the breeding program that had been carefully managed for so many generations, and tell her to do what she had been trained to do. For Irulan there was no alternative but to do as her husband demanded and use her knowledge and skills to please him.   </p><p>None of that knowledge was hands-on, however. The women the Bene Gesserit put into positions as the wives and concubines of such powerful nobles were always offered as virgins, and as the daughter of Shaddam IV they had been even more careful to keep her pristine in fact if not in knowledge. She had done her reading and had been taught all about the male anatomy. She'd gotten to observe fellow Bene Gesserit women in action with male breeders as well, but only from a safe distance.</p><p>As such, her husband's cock was the first one she'd seen from such a close distance. It would have thus been a memorable sight for her regardless of his size, but even if she'd never seen one right in front of her this closely before, her knowledge was sufficient for her to recognize that Paul's penis was bigger than the average male's. It was <em>far</em> bigger, in fact; in both length and width this was on the upper end of the spectrum for sure.</p><p>Intellectually she knew this should not have come as a surprise for her. Just as she was the product of more than 10,000 Standard Years of carefully selected breeding among bloodlines, so too was he. He was the Kwisatz Haderach come one generation sooner than he was supposed to. She was made up of humanity's best, and so was he. He'd been on the smaller side physically as a teen, or so she'd been told, but he'd grown into a tall and muscular adult, and whatever she might feel about him personally, she was not blind to the fact that he was a physically handsome and appealing man. But knowing and accepting all of that was one thing, and seeing his massive cock with her very eyes was another thing.</p><p>"Are you going to stare at it, or are you going to suck it?" he asked. "You said you wanted my attention? Well here you are, Irulan. Let's see what those scheming witches taught you."</p><p>Irulan wrapped her hands around Paul's shaft and brought her mouth towards him. She licked around the head first, letting her tongue get him wet as an introduction. She continued downwards, licking along his daunting length until he was pretty well coated in her saliva. Once that was done she took the tip between her lips and began to suck him properly.</p><p>It was a task easier said than done. Even with as much knowledge as she'd had imparted on her by the Bene Gesserit in their thorough and detailed teachings, there was no true replacement for experiencing it for yourself. She'd been warned as much back then, and had even been cautioned that the male she would breed with would almost assuredly be larger and more difficult to handle than most, owing to their breeding.</p><p>But this was no mere noble she was dealing with. This was the end result of all of those thousands of years of careful breeding; this was the Kwisatz Haderach. Paul wasn't who she had been intended for, nor was he even supposed to have existed. But the Lady Jessica had made her choice and birthed Paul rather than the daughter who was to have married Feyd Rautha Harkonnen, and so here Irulan found herself. Paul's cock was so wide that it was hard to get her lips around him and move her head with any of the skillful techniques she'd been taught. She'd been trained for this moment, but when the moment she'd been trained for had finally arrived she found herself lacking, and it galled her. No matter how the situation had come about or what she thought of the man forcing his attentions upon her now after years of neglect, the feeling of failure did not sit well with her.</p><p>"Is this it?" Paul asked, mocking her. "Is this really all you can do? Did those witches teach you nothing at all?"</p><p>Irulan's green eyes narrowed. She could not allow this to continue on in this way. She took a quick moment to mentally compose herself, and then she resumed sucking him with a renewed purpose and focus.</p><p>With her head clear and her anger quelled, at least for the moment, Irulan was able to remember her lessons with greater clarity. Paul's cock was large, yes; larger than she'd expected, and larger than any she'd ever observed from any distance. It was still a cock though, functionally like any other. Kwisatz Haderach and Emperor he may be, but Paul Muad'Dib was still made of human flesh. The same techniques she'd been taught would work on him just as they would on any other male.</p><p>Remembering what she'd learned, Irulan moved beyond her initial awkward attempts to bob her head on his length and focused on stimulating him. Her lips smoothly slid down, making slow yet steady progress rather than trying and failing to take on more of his length than she'd been ready for. She swished her tongue around as well, rotating it in a circle across his cock as she sucked him. Irulan also made constant use of her hands. She would grip him firmly and stroke whatever was not in her mouth, and her fingers would go lower and give the underside of his testicles the occasional tickle for a brief stimulation.</p><p>Though he did not praise her openly, Irulan could tell that her second attempt was succeeding where her first had come up short. She was pleasing Paul, whether he would admit it or not. Knowing that it was working only made her bolder and pushed her to finish him off more quickly. She kept going using lips, tongue and hands to please her husband. Not so long ago it would have given her great satisfaction to have managed this and accomplish what she'd been brought to Arrakis to do. Now there was only a sense of spiteful vengeance.</p><p>There was no warning before Paul finished. All she got was a grunt and a jerking of his hips, and then he was cumming inside of her mouth. Irulan was surprised for just a moment, but her training kicked in again and prevented her from being overwhelmed. There was a considerable amount of semen that wound up in her mouth, but she swallowed every last bit of it.</p><p>It was a victory, or it was as close to it as she could get to one in this situation at least.    </p><p>--</p><p>Paul was impressed. The witches of the Bene Gesserit had done a good job of training Irulan; there was no doubt about that. He had no reason to doubt that this had been the first blowjob she'd ever given, and yet it was at least as good as any Chani had ever given him in their years together. He would never <em>tell</em> Irulan that, of course, but he could not deny the truth of it within his own head.</p><p>"That was a decent effort, at least once you got past your initial floundering," he said, which was as close to acknowledging her skill as he planned on coming. "I will reward you later on." She looked mildly surprised by that, but she was soon surprised for a different reason as he drew his crysknife and cut her dress off of her body. He had ruined the expensive dress beyond repair, not that he cared. Of far more interest to him was what it had previously been covering. With her panties already removed, Irulan was now naked in front of him for the first time.</p><p>Irulan’s body was, in a word, perfection given human form. From her long golden hair and green eyes down to her massive breasts, smooth skin, alluring figure and pretty pink cunt only partially hidden between her long, shapely legs, and even around to the sexy back and curvy rear he knew he would see if he rolled her back over onto her stomach, there was not a bad angle from which to observe Irulan. He was married to a truly flawless physical specimen, and for the first time in their years of marriage he allowed himself to appreciate that fact. He’d never dwelled on his wife’s beauty because his love and attention had always been reserved for Chani, his Fremen concubine who had held his heart before he’d even met Irulan.</p><p>It felt like something of a betrayal to Chani to even acknowledge it, but the analytical, logical side of Paul could not ignore that there was really no comparison between the two on a purely physical level. His red-haired Fremen lover was beautiful; he doubted many would argue against that. But she was just a woman, a Fremen of the desert who had captured his heart. Irulan had been bred for perfection.     </p><p>Irulan’s was the most voluptuous body Paul had ever seen, without exception. At first this might not seem like such an impressive feat since Chani was the one and only woman he’d ever made love to or seen with his own eyes in this way, but that was before you took Paul’s unique circumstances into account. Thanks to all of the ancestral memories he had, he had the bodies of literally millions of women throughout human history stored in his brain. As his eyes took in Irulan naked, he seriously considered the possibility that she may be the most beautiful woman to have ever lived. This didn’t even seem to be such an unreasonable thought to him. On the contrary, it seemed perfectly understandable and perhaps even expected for Irulan to represent the pinnacle of human beauty. After all, she was the product of the breeding program that had been carefully managed by the Bene Gesserit for over ten thousand years. Why <em>shouldn’t</em> she be the most beautiful woman to have ever lived?</p><p>And Chani notwithstanding, he did have a thing for blondes, he had to admit.</p><p>Paul used the tattered remnants of his wife’s expensive dress he’d just cut off to tie her hands behind her back, and then he shoved her back down and paddled her ass with the hairbrush again. He didn’t go for long this time; he’d already proven his point there, and he could easily see the mark he’d made on her from before. This was just a chance for him to have a little bit of fun and remind her of her position here.</p><p>At first he’d been planning on claiming her virginity next, but as he finished up with the paddling and stared at her bright red ass another idea came to him. He would get around to claiming her maidenhead soon enough, but first he was going to claim something else.</p><p>“That’s the wrong hole!” Irulan gasped as she felt the head of his cock press against her anus. Paul chuckled.</p><p>“That’s where you’re wrong, wife,” he said. It was amusing to him that she thought it had been an error on his part, as if he didn’t know what he was doing and had aimed his cock too high by mistake. Chani had been his lover for years; he knew exactly what he was doing. She was the one with no experience, but that was about to change.</p><p>He pushed his hips forward and entered his wife’s ass, making them both groan. For Irulan her reasons for groaning were obvious. She’d never had a cock inside her; he would bet that she’d never even handled a cock herself until today. Having a cock go inside of her ass before she’d even lost her virginity was not the way things were ordinarily supposed to go, but she had no say in this matter. All she could do was do her best to endure it.</p><p>As for Paul, he groaned because he’d never felt anything like this. While he was no stranger to sex, this was a first for him. Chani was a very giving lover, but he’d never even considered asking her for anal sex. She might have tried it if he’d asked, but between her slight body and his large cock he’d always been too afraid of hurting her.</p><p>With Irulan he had no such concerns. If she was uncomfortable with having his cock pushing into her ass, so be it. If it hurt her when he put his hands on her hips and started to move back and forth inside of her, that was too bad for her. She might have been his wife but she wasn’t his lover, and he didn’t care if she enjoyed herself or was in pain. In his mind she’d asked for this; she’d told him even rough sex and abuse would have been better than leaving her untouched. Now he was putting that belief to the test, and it was a very rough test at that.   </p><p>Paul was not gentle with her. He’d always wanted to try anal sex, and now that he had his cock up a woman’s ass for the first time he was not in the mood to hold back. And since he was doing this to Irulan rather than Chani, he gave in to that impulse and roughly fucked her ass. His hips smacked against her plump rear cheeks, creating a clapping sound throughout her chambers that he found fascinating. She was grunting as well; he could tell she was trying to stifle her reactions, but there was no hiding how much her first anal pounding was taking out of her.</p><p>This was every bit as good as Paul had always imagined it would be, though he wondered how much of that was this being his first experience with anal sex and how much of it was the woman he was currently sodomizing. Irulan might be a bitch and a schemer of the Bene Gesserit, but there was no disputing her physical appeal. Hers was a body made for admiration; it was a body made to incite lust in men and get them to do what she wanted.</p><p>It was also a body made for fucking, and that's precisely what Paul did with it. He drove his hips forward again and again, forcing his cock ever deeper into Irulan's tight ass. Were she anyone else he might have refrained from giving in to his baser desires like this, especially when he saw how hard her body was rocking in response to his forceful thrusts, but with Irulan he not only wasn't concerned about her comfort but actively <em>wanted</em> her to feel this. She'd declared that this would be better than being ignored, and as he listened to the groans he forced out of her, he wondered whether she would still make that statement with such anger and conviction.</p><p>Paul continued to use his wife's lovely ass until he'd had his fill of her. She exhaled when he pulled his cock out of her at last, but then gasped as he rolled her over onto her back once again.</p><p>"Did you think I was done with you?" he asked, raising an eyebrow at her. "We have five years' worth of neglect to take care of. And since you did an acceptable job with your mouth earlier, it's time for me to return the favor."</p><p>Her eyes widened when he cut off another strip of what was once a fancy dress, balled it up and stuck it into her mouth as a makeshift gag. She tensed up, clearly expecting him to move straight to taking her true virginity, but that was going to wait. He wasn't kidding about giving her a reward.</p><p>Irulan groaned into her dress gag when he spread her legs with his hands and lowered his head between her thighs, and he could feel her body shift when his tongue made first contact with her vulva.</p><p>Unlike anal sex, this was something Paul had a considerable amount of hands-on (or make that mouth-on) experience with. He and Chani had used their mouths on each other many times over the course of their relationship, and he'd become well versed in knowing how to please her and make her scream with his tongue.</p><p>All women had different likes and dislikes though, so Paul knew he wouldn't necessarily be able to please Irulan using the same techniques that he'd found worked so well with his concubine. He knew enough to find his way quickly though, and between his fingers pushing inside of her and curling inwards and the sweeps of his tongue across her clit, he had her squirming and moaning into her gag easily enough.</p><p>While he hadn't been the least bit concerned with her comfort or enjoyment while he was helping himself to her ass, this was different. However reluctant she might have been to have him in her chambers, he wanted to leave her no choice but to acknowledge that he'd brought her pleasure with his mouth. This was always an activity he had enjoyed doing; he loved feeling his lover squirm and writhe and listening to them moan and scream, knowing he was responsible for it. And even though he didn't like Irulan, he still got that same sense of enjoyment here. If anything it might have been even <em>more </em>gratifying to draw those reactions from her since she did not like him and was probably ashamed of herself for giving in and expressing the pleasure he was forcing on her.</p><p>And aside from that, her cunt tasted divine.</p><p>Paul continued to lick and finger his wife until she spasmed and squirted against his face. He smiled against her when he felt it. It was the final sign that he'd succeeded in breaking her down and forcing pleasure out of her, whether she wanted to feel it or not.</p><p>He removed the gag and undid the bindings on her wrists after he was done. She panted for breath and rubbed at her wrists, but he gave her no time to take a break. He quickly kissed her and shoved his tongue into her mouth while his hands grabbed onto her large breasts and gave them a rough, commanding squeeze. She made some kind of gasp into his mouth, and he continued to explore her perfect body with his hands. He ran them down her back and grabbed onto her ass, groping and spanking her cheeks. There was so much more to hold onto back there than he was used to, and he wasn't complaining about that in the least.</p><p>Roughly kissing his wife and playing with her ass was fun, but eventually Paul wanted more. He broke away from her lips and removed his hands from her ass only to shove her back down flat on her back so he could move on to the final act. He'd already claimed her mouth and her ass; now it was time for him to take that final step and make her his completely.</p><p>A mix of emotions seemed to be running through Irulan's face as he got into position between her legs and guided his cock to rest against the outer lips of her cunt. This was what she had been striving for. For five years she had been trying to entice him into climbing into bed with her, claiming her as a husband was expected to claim his wife and put his seed inside of her. She'd wanted him to rip her chastity away and put a baby inside of her, and now it was about to happen at last. Only it had finally come after she had given up on ever being with him like this, and had even decided she was better off without him. What a bitter irony it must have been for her.</p><p>Paul shoved his cock into her roughly, tearing her maidenhead away at last and consummating his marriage to his wife after five years. He was fulfilling and breaking promises at the same time; he was doing what had always been expected of him as Irulan's husband, but betraying the promise he'd made to never touch her and remain faithful to Chani, though in fairness he'd already broken that promise the moment he reentered Irulan's chambers. He wasn't sure how he would feel about what he'd just done in the future. It was quite possible that he might feel regret or guilt about going back on his word, but at least in the short term he felt nothing of the sort. He'd promised to remain faithful to Chani, yes, but then she'd left and decided they both needed time apart from each other.</p><p>The real reason, the bigger reason behind his lack of guilt was that it was impossible to feel any regret while inside of his wife's tight cunt. He had never felt anything that fit him quite so perfectly. Even her ass, tight as it had been, didn't feel like such a natural home for him compared to this. It had almost been too tight; this was just right, like her cunt had been made specifically for him. And he supposed that in a sense this was actually true.</p><p>He had entered her quickly and without thought, but he was reminded of her virginal status when he saw her grimace as her maidenhead was pierced. Despite everything, despite his intention of coming in here to show her how much worse things could have been for her by being as rough with her as he pleased, he stopped still when he saw her wince of pain. It seemed that he was still capable of showing her at least a semblance of consideration.</p><p>Irulan's green eyes blinked open, but if he'd been expecting a bit of gratitude for giving her a break he would have been left wanting. She smiled bitterly at him and shook her head.</p><p>"What's the matter, husband?" she asked. "Have you lost your nerve now that you've done something you can't take back? Afraid to fuck me now that the time has come? Are you afraid of what Chani will say when she finds out you've broken your promise to her--or maybe you're nervous that you're not man enough to make me feel it?"</p><p>Whatever shreds of sympathy Paul had been feeling for his wife were swiftly doused by her taunting. He shook his head, annoyed at her for throwing Chani in his face and also for challenging him.</p><p>"If you want me to be rough with you, I will have no problem obliging you," he promised, glaring down into her eyes. Her face lost most of its smug defiance as she saw his glare, and then he showed her what she was in store for by driving his hips forward and burying his cock all the way inside of her with one big thrust.</p><p>Irulan hissed in discomfort as his thick cock pushed into the depths of her previously untouched cunt, but that was only the beginning. He had the urge to keep on thrusting and unlike his first time with Chani, where he'd ignored his body's demands to make sure his lover had a good time and was taken care of, he had no interest in showing Irulan even the slightest bit of consideration now. He slid his cock back and then stabbed it forward into her again, pushing inside even faster and harder this time.</p><p>Paul was like a madman, a wild beast, not sparing even the slightest thought for his lover and listening only to the lust that drove him. Again and again he thrust his cock into Irulan, his hips a blur as he fucked his wife with all his might. She was his wife rather than his concubine, but in thought as well as action her role was the complete inverse of Chani's. He used her more like a whore than a wife, fucking her without a care.</p><p>This was sex unlike any that Paul had ever had, and in the back of his head he felt that he could easily grow addicted to it. For a few moments in time he forgot about everything else that had been weighing him down not just for the two weeks that Chani had been gone, but for literally years. The fanaticism that surrounded his name and led directly to the Jihad that he had been unable to stop and had instead tried to lessen and control to keep casualties down, with little success, the perils of prescience, the pressures of ruling and the frustration over the crumbling of his relationship with his lover were all relegated into nothingness for these few blissful minutes where he fucked Irulan as hard as he desired.</p><p>He did not fight his orgasm when he felt it approaching; instead he just pinned her wrists to the bed with his hand and continued to fuck her. The surprise for him came when Irulan suddenly groaned and squirmed beneath him, and a smile slowly spread on his face when he realized she was having her second orgasm of the night. He hadn't expected her to get off from this, not during her first time, not right after having her maidenhead pierced and especially not while being fucked so hard. The fact that she was orgasming from this delighted him, and had his mind racing towards all of the ways he could exploit Irulan's body in the future. He'd already been thinking along those lines, but it was made even more fun now. If he could make her feel pleasure like this, however reluctantly it might be on her part, it was going to be all the more interesting to play with her and see how she would react.</p><p>For the moment he had more pressing concerns though, namely his own orgasm. He'd been all but there already, and feeling, seeing and hearing Irulan's unexpected climax was all that it took for him to finish. He grunted, reared back for one final push and then began to cum inside of her. Irulan’s eyes had drifted closed during her own orgasm, but they shot back open as she realized what was now happening. He hadn’t just taken her virginity away from her after five years of marriage, but was now doing what had been expected of him and what she had tried to convince, coerce, seduce and manipulate him into doing for years. He was filling her with his seed. The Bene Gesserit would have been overjoyed if they were in the room to watch, but Irulan didn’t look nearly as happy about it as she would have not so long ago.</p><p>As he pulled his cock out of her at last, he was honestly a bit surprised at how good he felt. It felt like a weight had been taken off of him, a weight that had been pressing down on him for months if not years. He had to admit to himself that this had been the best sex of his life, which said a lot about both her talent and how fun it was to let go and simply fuck someone without reservation. It was doubly impressive since she had been completely inexperienced before tonight, as he was reminded when he looked down and saw her virginal blood staining the bed beneath her.</p><p>He’d already been heavily leaning towards making this more than a one time thing, a single occurrence where he showed her how foolish she’d been to complain about how he’d ignored her for all these years, and the way he felt upon finishing up with her sealed his decision. There was no way he could let this go now.</p><p>“Before I let you sleep off the fucking I just gave you, we need to discuss the changes in your duties from now on,” he said. Irulan had been staring up at the ceiling, but now she focused on him again.</p><p>“My duties?” she asked, looking at him warily.</p><p>“Yes,” he said. “For starters, you will no longer be entitled to the generous allowance I’ve provided you up until now. From now on I will personally control all of your spending to make sure you aren’t using the Imperium’s money in ways I don’t approve of. I hadn’t thought this was a concern until today, but your personal animosity towards me says otherwise.” And that animosity would only increase after what he’d just done, of course.</p><p>Irulan looked annoyed, but she didn’t protest. “Anything else?” she asked, sounding disinterested and bored. Anyone else might have been fooled, but he could sense her anxiety easily enough.</p><p>“You will also be removed from the council,” he said. “I can’t trust you to offer suggestions that would be in the best interests of the Imperium, again owing to your dislike of me. Aside from that, being on the council would interfere with your more important responsibility, which is to be readily available to be used for my pleasure.”</p><p>“So you’re finally doing what you should have done as my husband five years ago, then?” she asked. “Now that your concubine has run out on you, you’re finally going to impregnate your wife like you should have been trying to do from the very beginning?” Her face was carefully blank, and he honestly couldn’t tell how she felt about the idea. Maybe she didn’t even know how to feel herself.</p><p>“I didn’t say anything about breeding you,” he said, shaking his head. “You may be my wife in name, but in reality you’re going to be nothing more than my whore. I’m going to use you and fuck you just like I did tonight, but that’s all. Only Chani will bear me an heir. To make sure of this, I will put the same contraceptives you’ve been feeding to Chani put into your food and drink instead.”</p><p>Irulan gasped and looked at him fearfully. He chuckled; amused that she honestly thought she’d managed to pull her scheme off for so long without him noticing. He no longer cared about the Bene Gesserit finding out he’d known about it and did nothing to stop it. His manner of speaking had suggested he still intended to impregnate Chani and only Chani, and that was enough for now. Let them ponder his previous inaction.</p><p>She flinched as if afraid he would hit her when he reached out, but it was only so he could grab her arms, pull them over her head and tie her hands to the bedpost. She didn’t even bother trying to test the strength of her bonds; she knew she wasn’t going anywhere. And even if she could escape, where would she go? She didn’t have a friend on the planet, and even if by some chance she could get off of Arrakis and make it into the company of her fellow Bene Gesserit witches, or into seclusion on Salusa Secundus with the rest of her family, what would they do for her? They would both tell her that her place was here, with her husband, birthing the next heir to the Empire, especially now that he’d finally deigned to touch her. As surely as she was bound to the bed, she was also bound here, with him, and so she would remain.  </p><p>“Welcome to your new life, wife,” he said. She fell asleep surprisingly easily, but he supposed exhaustion overrode anything else she was feeling at the moment.</p><p>As for him, sleep came easier than it had at any point in the last two weeks. He felt satisfied in a way he never had, not even when Chani was here with him. For the first time in his life he had let go, and it had been better than he could have ever hoped for.</p><p>How strange that something he’d never glimpsed in any possible future (Chani’s departure) had led to something that brought him such comfort.    </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Duties and Dreams</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Irulan adjusts to her new position well--perhaps too well, in her opinion.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Content Warnings/Themes: Noncon/dubcon, spanking, humiliation</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Irulan woke sorer than she could ever remember being. It took her a moment to figure out why that should be, but then the memories of the previous evening came rushing back to her. Her <em>husband</em> had finally deigned to place his hands on her, to bed her and take her virginity away, all in some sort of perverse attempt to prove to her that she really had been better off being ignored by him for the first five years of their marriage. She was inclined to agree with him.</p><p>How ironic that he’d finally touched her only <em>after</em> she’d given up on ever having a place in his bed!</p><p>She’d been optimistic at the start of their marriage. That day she’d met him when he came to treat with her father, she’d been impressed by him, even admired him. However her father might have felt about the way things had gone, she couldn’t help but respect the way he’d survived the attempt by the Harkonnens and her father’s own Sardaukar to end the Atreides line, survived in the desert, won the support of the Fremen and backed her father into a corner. Such a man would be capable of great things, and she felt that together they would be able to make the Imperium thrive. And it certainly didn’t hurt that he’d been easy on the eyes! The Bene Gesserit breeding program had done its work successfully in Paul Atreides, in more ways than one.</p><p>The presence of Chani as his royal consort had been a complication from the very beginning, but she’d initially hoped that Paul would still come to love her in time. But time had passed and her hopes for a loving marriage had evaporated as he treated Chani as his wife in all but name and treated Irulan with cordial indifference, when he treated her with anything at all. Still she’d hoped that they could at least come to respect each other, and have a bond over a shared love of the children she would bear him when he accepted the realities of his position and lay with her for political reasons even if Chani held his heart and his loyalty.</p><p>That had never happened though. She’d had to watch as Chani, a Fremen concubine, was treated with more status and respect than her, the daughter of Shaddam Corrino and wife of the emperor. She’d had to watch as Paul remained loyal to his concubine and ignored his wife, and she’d had to retire to a cold bed every night.</p><p>She’d still persisted, not giving up on the mission she had been tasked with by the Sisterhood. She didn’t need to give birth to Paul’s children solely to provide heirs for the imperial throne; she also needed to do so for the Bene Gesserit breeding program. That Paul loved Chani fiercely and showed no such love or devotion or even basic respect to her had wounded her deeply, but she had still kept trying. She’d tried numerous times to make Paul see reason and get him to breed with her for practicality if nothing else, and dosed Chani with contraceptives in the meantime to make sure she would not get pregnant. Whether he loved her, respected her or even liked her was immaterial. All she needed was for him to mate with her.</p><p>It had all worn on her though. It wasn’t just the sorry state of her nonexistent marriage with Paul that upset her, but also how she was ignored and considered a disappointment by others. She was nothing more than a pawn to the Sisterhood; a disappointment who had at first been believed to have even more potential than her extremely gifted mother when she first started training, but was not regarded as nothing more than a slightly better than average acolyte, if that. And of course they viewed her continued failure to get a child from Paul as another sign of her lack of usefulness.</p><p>The council meeting following the massacre of Seprek had been a tipping point for her. She’d been beyond fed up with the lack of respect already, but having her very obvious and valid suggestion on how to handle Haatim shot down, and herself insulted and denigrated in the process, had been the final blow that had finally caused her to give up.</p><p>It was after that meeting that she decided she would no longer follow the Sisterhood’s orders on her marriage. She would stop trying to figure out some way to get him into her bed. Whether through seduction, sentimentality, practicality or even deception, there was no way she would ever get him to touch her, so why bother trying? He hadn’t even respected her enough to stop his sister or Korba from openly insulting her to her face or said a word in her defense, even after Gurney Halleck had come and made the same suggestion she had, only he’d actually gotten the support of the council and Paul. If he thought so little of her, she would no longer waste her time trying to get him to bed her.  </p><p>That decision had been freeing in a way. She had even sent the Sisterhood a communication letting them know that she would no longer be trying to get Paul to impregnate her. That had closed the door forever in her mind. And then, of course, he’d chosen that time of all times to actually consummate their marriage and claim her as his.</p><p>“Good morning, wife,” Paul said as her eyes blinked open. She glared at him, but it wasn’t like she could go anywhere. Her hands were still tied to the bedpost. When he realized she wasn’t going to say anything he just chuckled and undid her bindings. Irulan shook her hands and rubbed at her sore wrists, but then decided that she did not at all enjoy being naked in front of her <em>husband</em>.</p><p>She got up off of her bed, and he made no move to stop her. Her intention to go and grab clothes to put on was quickly dashed, though, as she noticed that the drawers which had once contained her underthings were now empty and scattered around her room.</p><p>“Where are my clothes?!” she hissed.</p><p>“I threw them out the window,” Paul said, nodding towards her open balcony window.</p><p>“And why would you do that?!” It had been not just her panties but all of her chemises, leotards and essentially anything else she would wear underneath her regular clothing that had been in those drawers and were now apparently gone.</p><p>“You won’t be wearing underwear from now on,” he said calmly. “It would only get in the way of me fucking you.”</p><p>Irulan shook her head and stomped over towards the window, seething in silence. She looked out in a fruitless hope of finding <em>something</em> that could be salvaged, but it was hopeless. Paul’s palace was so massive and they were so high up that she didn’t have a hope of seeing where her underwear could have landed. He’d thrown it all out, she would have nothing to wear underneath her clothing, and there was nothing she could do about it.</p><p>“Let’s take a bath,” he said after giving her a chance to see for herself that her underwear was gone. Irulan knew that this wasn’t a request. She heaved a sigh of defeat and followed him into the bath.</p><p>The water might have been relaxing on her sore body if she’d been bathing alone, but having Paul in the bath with her soured the entire experience for her. She tried her best to ignore him and concentrate on bathing herself, but he made this an all but impossible task. His hands were on her quickly, and they never left. First he put both hands on her big breasts and squeezed, playing with them roughly and making her wince. Doubtless he was so interested in them because Chani’s breasts were nowhere near as big as hers. Once this might have given Irulan some small sense of satisfaction, but right now she wished her breasts weren’t quite as big and didn’t interest him as much as they did.</p><p>It wasn’t any real relief when he stopped squeezing her breasts, because he moved to sucking on them. He took first one breast and then the other into his mouth, suckling at her flesh and on her nipple as if he was a nursing baby. What a twisted parody <em>that </em>was! He’d denied her a baby all these years, yet now was assuming a similar role himself.</p><p>While sucking her breasts he also began to fondle her ass as well, and his hands were no gentler there than they had been with her chest. He squeezed her full ass possessively and sucked on her breasts, and Irulan was forced to give up any attempt to genuinely bathe herself. She was at his mercy and would bathe when he felt like allowing her to do so.</p><p>His fingers went between her legs next, rubbing her crotch before sliding into her pussy itself. Irulan groaned as he fingered her under the warm water. This was something she’d done to herself on occasion, but it was very different now with these larger fingers that were not her own touching her, and not moving in the ways she always would have. It certainly didn’t help that she was still sore from her aggressive introduction to sex the night before.</p><p>She’d been hoping he would tire of sliding his fingers in her pussy and would get bored and let her get out soon, but she knew those hopes were futile as soon as she felt his erect cock pressing against her. He would no doubt be looking to put that erection to use, and with Chani gone it would fall to her.</p><p>“I’m going to take you again now,” he said matter-of-factly while pulling his fingers out of her at last. “Get down on your knees, and rest your hands on the side of the tub.”</p><p>What could Irulan do but go along with it? She assumed the position he requested, and bit her lip as she felt the head of his cock press against her. Her husband’s cock had taken her virginity at last the previous evening, after she’d given up on it ever happening, and now it was going inside of her again.</p><p>Paul slid his cock inside of her easily despite the water dripping from both their bodies, and he started thrusting quickly. He was no gentler with her now than he had been the previous evening, and while she at least didn’t have the pain of her first time to deal with, her body was still sore from their previous night’s activities. He fucked her hard, his hips slapping against her ass and thighs from behind hard enough to make some of the water slosh over the edge of the tub and onto the floor. Paul didn’t seem to care about the mess that he was making, nor about the discomfort she was feeling as her sore body absorbed this rough fuck in the tub. Just as he’d done the previous evening, Paul used her selfishly and worried only about his own pleasure and enjoyment.</p><p>There was no warning before Paul finished, aside from the increased snapping of his hips that made her scrabble and press her hands against the wall harder for something to steady herself. He came inside of her without a care, just as he’d done the previous night. It was what she’d been trying to entice him to do for years, and he was only doing it now that she’d given up on ever making it happen. There was no chance of it leading to its intended conclusion and getting her pregnant of course, which had been the entire point of why she’d wanted it to happen. He’d made it clear that he would be feeding her contraceptives to ensure that did not happen (and he’d revealed he knew all about her doing the same to Chani, which had been a terrifying revelation for her.) She wasn’t sure whether knowing she would not get pregnant was a relief because she’d finally given up on having his children, or just one more insult and reminder of her failures. Either way, there was nothing she could do but let it happen. He was her husband, and with Chani gone at last he'd turned his attention on her, whether she desired that attention or not.</p><p>--</p><p>"Put this on," Paul said, holding out a dress for her to change into after they'd gotten out of the bath and dried their bodies off. Irulan looked at the dress and wrinkled her nose with distaste. This particular dress was not one she had picked out herself, but rather had been a gift from the Sisterhood. It revealed more of her cleavage and gave a better glimpse of her long legs than she was comfortable with while out in public, as she had always tried to present a dignified and respectable image regardless of how she was treated. Its revealing nature had been why the Sisterhood had sent it to her, of course--they'd been hoping she could seduce Paul with it. She'd never worn it, but now would have to at Paul's 'request.' More bitter irony.</p><p><em>Sometimes we get what we've been hoping for, but not when or how we wanted to get it.</em> It was a lesson Paul was teaching to her as well as to the Bene Gesserit. Irulan grumbled, but she put the dress on. There wasn't much else she could do.</p><p>Harah soon entered with breakfast for both of them, and Irulan nearly flinched at the glare of purest hatred that Paul's Fremen servant shot at her. She'd never exactly been friendly with the woman, but this was hostility like Irulan had never seen from her.</p><p>She glared at the bed and at how thoroughly it had been soiled by Paul's claiming of his wife the previous night, and then put the food down on the table with far more force than was really necessary. It wasn't difficult for Irulan to deduce why Harah looked so angry with her. She knew how close Harah was to Chani, and even if Harah hadn't already had a very good idea of what had happened as soon as she was told to bring them breakfast in Irulan's chambers, the state of the bed would have made it blindingly obvious to her. Likely Harah thought this had been Irulan's doing; that she'd swooped in with Chani away from Arrakeen and finally succeeded in seducing Paul. The exact opposite thing had happened, of course, but Irulan knew it was pointless to try and convince Harah of that. The Fremen servant, like everyone else here in Arrakeen, did not respect Irulan and would not believe her words no matter how wise or truthful they might be. Knowing her words would be ignored if not actively disbelieved, Irulan kept her silence and watched Harah leave the room. Let the little fool hate her and think her responsible; what did it matter?</p><p>"Come and join me," Paul said, sitting down at the table and motioning for her to sit across from him. If he'd noticed Harah's anger he did not show it, and Irulan had a feeling he would only find it amusing anyway, especially since his servant's dislike was aimed at her rather than him, the one who was truly responsible.</p><p>Irulan looked at the food uncertainly as she sat down at the table, at war with herself. She was hungry; she'd eaten a light meal the previous evening, and then her husband had made her work up quite an appetite that night and again this morning in the bath. But she found herself wanting to refuse to eat, or even to toss the food out, solely to spite Paul.</p><p>"Go ahead and eat and drink it all," Paul said to her while she was still considering her options. "It's laced with contraceptives, and you'll be needing those after how much I've used you already, not to mention how frequently I'll be making use of you for the near future."</p><p>Paul had just unknowingly made her decision for her. While so many confusing thoughts and warring emotions were running through her head, one thing that solidified was a desire to reclaim any amount of power from Paul that she could. If he wanted her to eat the food and take the contraceptives, she would avoid doing so for no other reason than to rebel against her tyrant husband. She put her elbows on the table and stared at him defiantly.</p><p>"Do you think you can win some kind of contest here?" he asked, looking amused rather than annoyed. "You've been feeding Chani contraceptives without her knowing for quite some time, making sure she can never get pregnant. Now you will do the same. Your new position as my bed warmer will not get you any closer to birthing an Atreides child for your precious Bene Gesserit than anything else has for the last five years."</p><p>Irulan curled her lip in a parody of a smile. Did he really not understand her motives? She was a tool of the Sisterhood no longer; she just wished to spite him. "Who said anything about wanting to have your child, <em>husband?</em>" she asked. "I merely find that I have no appetite. Sometimes that happens when I'm in the presence of people that I detest."</p><p>Still Paul smiled, not moved to anger. "You will eat and drink," he said simply.</p><p>Irulan reached out for her cup as if to take a drink, but instead pushed it with the back of her hand and watched as the liquid spilled onto the table. "How clumsy of me," she said, looking up at him with false innocence. "By all means, husband, sit and eat while I clean up the mess I've made. You can even eat my share if you like."</p><p>"Sit," he said, stopping her before she could even think about getting up from her chair. "The sooner you cease with these pointless games the better it will be for you. You have no friends here, as you well know. There is not a sympathetic ear for you to turn to. The person in Arrakeen who likely sympathized with you most was Chani, and as you have pointed out, she is no longer here."</p><p>The saddest part from Irulan's perspective was that he was probably right about Chani being the one person in all of Arrakeen who might not have thought so poorly of her. The woman was his mere concubine rather than his wife, but after some initial awkwardness she had looked at Irulan not with suspicion but with pity.</p><p>"You are under my control," Paul continued. "If you don't eat, I will force you to eat, and it will not be pleasant for you. Make it easy on yourself and do it of your own volition. Our sex life will be rough enough on you as it is." </p><p>Irulan glared at him, but she began to eat regardless. Paul nodded once in satisfaction and turned his attention to his own food.</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan received a few hours of sweet freedom as Paul left her chambers to tend to matters of state, but her quiet solitude was interrupted when he returned in the evening, and he was not alone. He had a young male Fremen servant with him, and said servant was carrying a box of some sort with him. Irulan looked back and forth between that box and her husband uncomfortably. Whatever was in that box, she had a feeling it boded ill for her.</p><p>“I’ve brought you gifts to help you adjust to your important new position in the Imperium,” Paul said, nodding at Irulan.</p><p>“Unless it’s replacements for my clothing which you discarded, I don’t want it,” she said, crossing her arms and looking away from him.</p><p>“Whether you want it or not does not matter,” he said. “You will need the contents of this box in order to perform your new duties, so you will accept them.” He nodded at the Fremen servant, who put the box down next to Irulan and then left, his job accomplished.</p><p>She didn’t want to look into that box; she didn’t want to see a single thing that Paul had placed inside of it to give to her. If it were up to her she would pick that box up and throw it straight at his face. But Paul’s steady stare told her that he wasn’t going anywhere until she looked at the items he’d brought. It went without saying that openly defying him by hurling the box at him or attempting to destroy it would not be a wise decision. He’d ignored her for most of their marriage, but last night he’d shown her what he was capable of when he was angered. With no small amount of trepidation, she reached into the box and began pulling out items.</p><p>The first was a pair of metal handcuffs, which she looked at with skepticism. “And what are these for?” she asked. “Surely you don’t fear that I’ll overpower you and need to be restrained.”</p><p>“Of course not,” he said, laughing. “You may be a Bene Gesserit trained witch, but we both saw what happened when I subdued you. No, the cuffs are merely to enhance our time together, just like everything else contained in that box.”</p><p>Irulan was even more anxious now as she put the cuffs aside and moved on to the next item. Dread turned to genuine confusion as she looked this unfamiliar and oddly shaped item over. “What is this?”</p><p>“It’s a plug that goes inside of your ass,” Paul said, shrugging. “Using such a thing in sexual play had never even occurred to me, but it came highly recommended. I’m sure we’ll have a chance to test it out sooner or later.”</p><p>Briefly Irulan wondered who he’d talked to about this, and she even considered asking him before deciding that she’d rather not know. She put the strange plug off to the side along with the cuffs and pulled out the next object, which was a paddle. All she had to do was run her hand across it to know exactly what he intended to do with this.</p><p>“Yes, that one will come in handy when you decide to push me,” he said, smirking at her. Irulan frowned, sure that he would find an excuse to use it on her even if she behaved herself perfectly and followed every single command he gave her. She could already imagine him using this paddle to give her ass a spanking even more vicious than the one he’d given her the night before. He was capable of making her feel it with only his bare hand, as he’d already proven. How much harder would the spankings be if he had this paddle to implement?</p><p>“Pull the next two out together,” Paul instructed. “We’ll be seeing them both in combination sooner or later anyway.”</p><p>Irulan pulled out two items, holding one in each hand. In her left hand she held a long chain, and in her right was a thick collar studded with gems.</p><p>“The chain we’ll save for later,” Paul said. “I just wanted you to get a look at it and imagine what it’ll be like when we use them both together.” If that was his intention, it had been a complete success. Irulan could already imagine him putting the collar on her, attaching the chain to it and leading her around, tugging her and pulling her like she was something less than human, something undeserving of his respect.</p><p>“You can go ahead and put the chain down now,” he said, and Irulan did so happily. If it was up to her she would never touch or see that chain ever again. “But the collar goes on right now.”</p><p>Irulan glared down at the collar as if it was personally responsible for her current humiliation, but of course it was not the fancy collar or its gems that she was truly angry with. It was the man who had presented it to her, the man who even now watched and waited for her to obey him.</p><p>She put the collar on, and Paul smiled wider than he had at any point all day. The click of it snapping into place sounded ominous to her ears in her otherwise silent chambers.</p><p>“It looks perfect on you,” Paul said. “You’ll have to get used to the feel of it around your neck, because you’ll be wearing it from now on. You can only take it off when I give you permission to do so.”</p><p>Irulan chafed at the idea that she would be collared like some pet. “Is that all, husband?”</p><p>“No,” he said. “From now until Chani returns you are to be confined to your rooms, and I will make use of you every evening and every morning.” Irulan grimaced, but he wasn’t done yet. “For that matter, I’ll make use of you whenever I happen to have the urge to fuck you.”</p><p>She was to be trapped in her rooms, evening and morning ‘visits’ were a guarantee, and she could also expect occasional unannounced arrivals from her husband if he happened to decide he felt like fucking her? Irulan could only hope that Chani would return soon, or something else would happen that took Paul’s attention away from her. Anything to get her out of the situation that she now faced.</p><p>--</p><p>Paul didn't wait long to find an effective use for the handcuffs. He used them that very evening in fact. Irulan had not tried to fight when he went to put them on her, knowing that any such resistance would fail and only cause her greater strife in the end. She'd allowed him to cuff her and shove her down on the bed, which led to her current predicament.</p><p>If she'd thought he had fucked the aggression out of his system the first night he'd claimed her, or flushed the rest of it out in the bath the following morning, she would have been dismayed by what happened. As it was she had already resigned herself to such treatment becoming the norm, so she wasn't caught by surprise by how he took her once she was cuffed and spread out on the bed for him. Her lack of surprise didn't make it any easier to take, however.</p><p>He fucked her with every bit the same sort of dominant, unyielding force he had from the moment he decided to prove to her that she would have been better off being ignored. His hips drove into her harshly, uncaring of her soreness, and his cock hit deep inside of her with every thrust. Her body was slightly more used to accommodating his cock now after multiple turns already, so at least she had that going for her.</p><p>It was small consolation for her, however. Irulan had always believed herself to be in control of her own life. Even in being married off to the man who had dethroned her family and driven her father into exile, she was merely doing what she had been born to do and trained to do by the Bene Gesserit. She would preserve the Corrino bloodline through childbirth, and in the process play her part in the Sisterhood's breeding program. For five years she had still held the belief that she could make it happen some day, that she would find some way to convince her husband to do his duty to her and to the Imperium and impregnate her. Once that happened, all would know that Irulan had done what she set out to do.</p><p>That hadn't happened though. She'd never gotten the children she was married off to Paul to provide, and her pride and dignity had been stripped away from her. And once she'd finally given up on her hopes of one day sharing her husband's bed if not his heart, he'd taken even that choice away from her and removed the sliver of self-satisfaction and control she'd felt after making that decision.</p><p>This was just one more reminder of how powerless she actually was now. Her hands were cuffed together and she was able to do nothing about anything that was happening to her. And even if her hands <em>weren't </em>cuffed, even if she'd had complete freedom to move her body, what good would it have done her? Paul would still have her either way. He would still be covering her body with his strong, tall frame and driving his hips against her just like this.</p><p>Irulan could do nothing but remain motionless on her back and silently accept the deep thrusts of her dominant husband. She'd finally gotten what she wanted from him; she'd finally gotten him in her bed. But nothing about it was going the way it was supposed to have gone. There had been a goal there, a mission to accomplish, a future to secure, and in carrying it out and giving birth to beautiful golden-haired Atreides children she would have been making her mark on history rather than merely writing about it.</p><p>That wasn't happening though. Even now, even with her husband having claimed her and having stated his intention to continue claiming her multiple times a day going forward, she had no chance of ever accomplishing her goal. She would never get pregnant, she would never have children of her own, and she would never do what she had been sent her to do. She would not make her own mark on history, at least not in the way she had hoped to. If she was to be remembered at all it would be as the childless wife, the woman who had been the price of political ascension for Paul Muad'Dib but had never held his heart or even his respect, the woman who was put to the side and ignored in favor of a Fremen concubine.</p><p>Even now that he was finally deigning to put his hands on her and stick his cock inside of her, he still had deemed her unworthy of bearing his children and would take steps to make sure she never did. He was firmly in control here. He controlled every aspect of her life, and now that included her body. With or without the handcuffs, she was powerless.</p><p>Irulan endured his attentions in silence, or at least she tried her best to do so. Paul did not make it easy on her with the sheer force of his fucking. His hips smacked against her body repeatedly, his cock picking up even greater speed as her body got used to him. There were several times that she nearly moaned or groaned out loud in response to what she was feeling, but she was able to use her Bene Gesserit training to control herself.</p><p>All of that changed when his cock forced an unwilling orgasm out of her. Her mind hated every second of this and cried out against her loss of control over her own life, but her body responded to this treatment on a level she was similarly powerless to do anything about. It was her climax that finally forced a reluctant moan out of her. Even as her body embraced the pleasure, Irulan wasn't sure she'd ever felt worse. It was just one more thing she had no control over. Her marriage had failed and would never give her the children she'd hoped for, her husband had decided to make her his own personal whore, her hands were cuffed together and now she couldn't even control her own body's response to how her husband used her.</p><p>She wasn't sure if Paul realized what he'd just done or whether he even cared, because he gave no sign of reacting to it that she could see. He just kept right on fucking her, making use of her body for several more minutes until he tensed on top of her and filled her with his seed. She would not be given the chance to use it for its natural purpose, of course, but she still had the <em>pleasure</em> of knowing that he was shooting it inside of her.</p><p>Paul was in no hurry to pull out of her, but when he eventually did he sat back on his knees and looked at her for a moment, expression unreadable. Irulan frowned, not sure what was going through his head and not at all sure she <em>wanted </em>to know for that matter.</p><p>He climbed off of her bed and cleaned himself up, and at first she thought he was going to leave her there like that for the night, her hands still cuffed together and leaving her in a very uncomfortable position. Then he walked over to her, undid the cuffs and pulled them off, leaving her free to rub her sore wrists. The gem-studded collar remained, of course. He'd made it clear she was not to remove it unless given permission by him, and he hadn't given any such permission yet.</p><p>"Rest well, wife," he said as he headed for the door. "I'll see you again in the morning."</p><p>Irulan was glad to see the back of him. Tomorrow could wait for tomorrow. At least she would get to sleep without him in her bed. For a few precious hours she would be alone.</p><p>Hopefully in that time she could mentally recover from the humiliating fact that no matter how her mind had felt about it, her body had been brought to orgasm by her husband.</p><p>--</p><p>"This is good. You did a good job last time you had my cock in your mouth, I'll give you that much, but forget about all of that Bene Gesserit training; this is much better."</p><p>The first time Irulan had serviced Paul with her mouth, he had allowed her to control the blowjob and prove her skill, and while she hadn't exactly enjoyed doing so at the time, it was infinitely preferable to this indignity.</p><p>Her collar was on as always, but this time the chain was attached to it as well. Paul held the other end of the chain in his hand and effectively used it as a leash. He wasn't giving her any opportunity to suck him this morning; this time it was him in control of everything. She knelt before him while he fucked her face, and occasionally he would give a tug on the chain to roughly pull her head back down on him after scant time to catch her breath. He would grab her golden hair and pull her into his thrusts, hold her down and make her gag on his cock. The feel of his balls smacking against her chin was a humiliation, and an oft repeated humiliation at that.</p><p>It was a very different feeling, having him be the one in control of what happened and fucking her face rather than sitting back and allowing her to demonstrate her skills. She'd previously thought it demeaning to have to suck on his cock, but this facefuck was far harder to accept, and not just physically.</p><p>Her cheeks were bright red, her green eyes watered and tears ran down her cheeks, and spittle escaped her mouth and dripped down her neck. He was reducing her into an absolute wreck.</p><p>Paul relished his control over her. As much as she knew he'd enjoyed her blowjob once she'd gotten over her initial awkwardness and called on her Bene Gesserit lessons, it was obvious to her by now that he got off on dominating her, on roughly using her body in a way he surely had never done with Chani and would never do with her in the future either, assuming she ever returned. He loved Chani, and even Irulan doubted he would be so rough with someone he loved.</p><p>He didn't love his wife though, and he had no problem using her to live out all of his darker fantasies. He fucked Irulan's face and made her gag on his cock without a care. Looking down and seeing the saliva on her neck or the tears on her cheeks would probably only excite him, and the slap of his balls against her chin would only encourage him to go faster so he could hear it more.</p><p>She could tell when Paul's orgasm was getting closer. He didn't come right out and tell her, but he didn't need to. It was obvious enough in the way he tugged on her chain harder, in the way his hips sped up and forced his cock down her mouth even faster, and in the way his breathing quickened. Irulan knew it was coming; she knew she was about to take a thick load of his semen down her throat, or across her face, or wherever else he happened to feel like finishing this time around. And there was nothing she could do about it. Even if she tried to pull back, he'd just tug her hair and make sure she went nowhere. If he pulled out of her mouth and she tried to pull her face away so it would not be a target, he could simply tug on her chain and make sure she had nowhere else to turn. Whatever he wanted from her, he could and would take.</p><p>What he wound up wanting this time around was to have her swallow it. He retreated so just the head of his cock was inside of her mouth, but a little tug of her chain served as a warning for her not to pull back. It was a warning she heeded, and she didn't even think about trying to remove him from her mouth. When he began to cum on her tongue, she swallowed it right away. There was no need for him to tell her what he wanted from her; it was obvious. Better for her to just get it over with, and with minimal fuss.</p><p>Paul kept the head inside of her mouth until he was finished cumming, and then he pulled back and let go of her chain. He sat back against the chair and sighed.</p><p>"This was an excellent morning session," he said. "And you didn't fight me on any of it. You didn't make any attempt to pull back, and you swallowed my semen without needing to be told. Three days into your new role and you're already adjusting so well. You have truly found your calling as my royal whore, Irulan."</p><p>It was yet another indignity; another show of disrespect. But it wasn't his words, his rough treatment of her or even the fact that he'd made her swallow his semen that had Irulan feeling so disturbed at the moment.</p><p>The real issue was that there was no mistaking the arousal between her thighs. As much as it wounded her pride to be under Paul's control, as much as she hated the feeling of his balls hitting her chin and the weight of the collar around her neck, her body wasn't listening to her mind. Self-respect be damned, there was a part of her that had <em>enjoyed</em> having Paul fuck her face, tug on her chain and make her swallow his seed. </p><p>What was wrong with her?</p><p>--</p><p>“You’d better not lose count,” Paul said, his voice taunting her every bit as much as the paddle rubbing across her ass cheek in circles, or the plug inside of her.</p><p>Tonight, Paul had decided to focus all of his attention on her ass. He’d simply groped and squeezed it at first while claiming her lips in a possessive kiss, but soon that hadn’t been enough for his liking. He’d stuck the plug inside of her, and she’d had little to no time to adjust to that before he took her across his knee and started to spank her with his hand. This was not the first time he’d taken his hand to her butt. Irulan already knew perfectly well what he was capable of, and he’d made her feel it plenty with only his hand.</p><p>Even that hadn’t been enough for him though. She’d been so absorbed in the spanking that she’d forgotten all about the other toy he still had on hand that would be a logical thing to introduce now, and she could have cursed herself for her forgetfulness when he pulled the paddle out and showed it to her. She hadn’t been able to contain her nervous gasp when she saw it, and he’d smiled upon hearing it.</p><p>“You earned 100 spanks in total with your cheek this morning,” he said. She closed her eyes, biting back the angry retort. She had apparently ‘earned’ this punishment this morning by being too slow to crawl over on her knees to suck his cock (or offer herself up to be facefucked, more accurately.) It was nonsense, and she nearly called him out on it. That would have been precisely what he wanted her to do though. The entire thing was just a pretense, a flimsy excuse for him to spank her. He would have gone with any little thing he could in order to give him a reason to proceed with his game, and all she would have accomplished by arguing the point would be to make sure he gave her even more spanks on top of these.</p><p>“I decided to be kind and allow you to take the first fifty from my hand,” he said, as if this was some kind of great favor he’d done for her. “The last half, however, will come from this paddle. I expect you to count them off, one by one, from one to fifty. I will allow for a bit of a delay if necessary, but if you take too long or fail to count one off, we will start over again from one. Do you understand?”</p><p>“I understand,” she said, going along with him so she could hurry up and get on with it. If there was anything she’d learned over the past week of being restricted to her rooms so she would be readily available to be used by her husband whenever he felt the desire, it was that he would only prolong things if she gave him difficulty or showed anger or frustration with what he was doing. The sooner they got this over with the sooner he would hopefully leave and let her go to sleep.</p><p>He wasn’t going to make it easy for her though, and he drove that point home with the first swing of the paddle down onto her naked ass. She’d been expecting a strong blow, but she’d still underestimated just how much harder the paddle would be compared to his hand. She nearly forgot to count it off, and even though starting over after the first one wouldn’t have been <em>that </em>big a deal ultimately, but she didn’t want to have to take any more swats like that than she had to.</p><p>“One!” she got out.</p><p>“Very good,” Paul said. “I was just about to start over. Try to be quicker from now on.”</p><p>She was indeed quicker when the next several spanks landed, though he didn’t let up at all. The paddle struck her ass with that same sharp impact every single time, moving from one cheek to the next at random intervals. He never gave her a consistent rhythm so she could anticipate when the next spank would fly or where it would land. The only thing she could count on was the paddle landing eventually, and making quite an impact when it did. Though it was tough, especially with the plug inside of her ass as well, she never forgot what she was supposed to be doing.</p><p>“Twenty three! Twenty four! Twenty five!” Whether the spanks landed in quick succession like now or he drew it out to tease her and drive her mad, she never lost count. That became harder and harder to keep up with as the tally got higher and her body felt the sting, but she couldn’t afford to stop now. She doubted her body would be able to take it if she came so far only to have to start over from the beginning.</p><p>“Thirty nine!” she called as the paddle struck her on the left ass cheek, which had just taken the last seven spanks in a row and was unbelievably sore at this point. She couldn’t decide whether she wanted him to keep at it and spare her right cheek, or spread the spankings out.</p><p>A flurry of paddle shots landed on the right cheek, one after the other, and she decided it probably would have been better if he’d just stayed on the left. Irulan was really feeling it now, and she was losing her voice at this point. Still she managed to call them out though, somehow, some way.</p><p>“Forty five! Forty six!” Her voice was shaky now, and she had to clear her throat to even keep it steady enough to be heard and understood.</p><p><em>Four more</em>, she thought to herself, using it as motivation to keep going. <em>Just four more to go!</em></p><p>She didn’t understand how it was possible, but he stayed just as strong towards the end of the spanking. If anything the blows might have gotten even harder the closer they got to the end. She knew her husband was strong, but this was ridiculous!</p><p>“Forty seven! Forty e-eight!” There was a pause and a tut of disapproval from Paul, and for a terrifying moment she thought he might be about to use her slight stutter as an excuse to start all over again, but then the paddle struck her again.</p><p>“Forty nine!” She never thought she’d be so happy to be struck across the ass with a paddle, but in this case it meant it was almost over. She was almost there! <em>Just one more, just one more!</em></p><p>“Before I give you your final spank, I’d like to ask you a question,” Paul said. Irulan whined.</p><p>“What is it?” she asked weakly. Why was he stalling <em>now</em>, damn him?!</p><p>Paul sounded extremely amused when he spoke. “Do you realize that you’ve been humping my leg for quite some time now?” </p><p>Irulan froze and shook her head automatically. <em>Of course </em>that couldn’t be true! It was ridiculous! There was no way she would be excited about Paul taking her over his knee and spanking her, first with his hand and then with a paddle!</p><p>But then, as she allowed herself to focus beyond the repetition of paddle on flesh and the responsibility to count each one off as it landed, she realized that her body was rocking against Paul’s leg at that very moment. When had that started?! And more importantly, why had it started? Why was she actually getting excited by being put in this position?</p><p>“Part of me thinks I should start over from the beginning,” Paul said. “This was supposed to be a punishment, after all. You weren’t supposed to <em>enjoy</em> it.”</p><p>“No!” she said quickly. “Please, no, not that! Anything but that!” There was no way she could take having to start all over again.</p><p>“And why are you so desperate to finish now?” Paul asked. “Is it so the spanking will stop? Or is it because you’re so close to finishing and you don’t want to be denied now?”</p><p>“I—“ Irulan opened her mouth to insist that it was just so the spanking could be over and done with, but the words wouldn’t come out.</p><p>“Be honest,” Paul said. “Whether I finish with one final spank or start over is dependent on you answering honestly.”</p><p>Irulan whined, unsure of what he wanted to hear. The price of guessing wrong would be severe, so in the end she just decided to be completely honest and hope he wouldn’t punish her for it. “I don’t know!” she said through a groan.</p><p>It was the truth. No more than a minute ago she would have been absolutely certain that she was just trying to get through this, but now that he’d brought her attention to it there was no denying the shameful heat in her body.</p><p>“Thank you for your honesty,” Paul said. She sighed in relief; apparently it was the right answer.</p><p>The paddle struck home one final time, and Irulan was aware of not just the spank but her body’s reaction to it more keenly than she had been with any of the others. Her hips had continued to grind against his leg the entire time, rubbing her pussy against him without conscious thought, and the spank brought her the rest of the way there.</p><p>“<em>Fifty!</em>” Irulan screamed, mindless of any servants who might be near enough to hear. It wasn’t like they hadn’t heard plenty already, but she wondered if the guilty pleasure she was feeling carried through in her voice.</p><p>Irulan’s entire body shook as she experienced the most confused climax of her life. It wasn’t the first time he’d made her cum while using her body for the last week, but at least the other times had made some sense. An orgasm while his admittedly large cock was inside of her, fucking her (and fucking her well at that) was just her body’s natural reaction to stimulation. But this? Cumming from having a plug inside of her ass, and humping her husband’s leg while he spanked her red with a paddle? This made no sense. It shouldn’t have ever happened. But it had.</p><p>She fully expected Paul to reposition her so he could fuck her. After all, he hadn’t actually fucked her since that morning, and not once over the last week had he left her presence without cumming at least once. But this time he simply put her down on her belly on her bed, put the paddle away and walked towards the door.</p><p>“I’ll leave you to think about this for the rest of the night,” he said.</p><p>She did.</p><p>--</p><p>As seemed to be happening with greater and greater frequency these days, when Paul Muad’Dib went to sleep he dreamed of things that had happened in previous lives, on previous worlds in a distant past.</p><p>Tonight his mind returned to Old Earth, the birthplace of humanity. He skipped from country to country, memory to memory, age to age. Even though all of these events had happened in the distant past and had been long forgotten by any living being who did not possess his sort of power, he could recall them vividly, as if they had happened only yesterday and he had been there to see all of them.</p><p>
  <em>He witnessed Salome dancing the Dance of the Seven Veils before her uncle, King Herod, and as her reward receiving the head of John the Baptist on a platter. He could see it all. He could see the grief on the face of the king who did not want to carry out this request but felt oathbound to do so. So he beheaded John in the prison and brought it to the girl on a platter, and the girl in turn presented it to her mother Herodias, who when Herod had offered the girl any reward up to half his kingdom, had told her daughter to ask for the head of John the Baptist. She could have had a reward equal to half of an entire kingdom, but instead she took John’s head.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>He witnessed the Sack of Rome by the Visigoths, led by King Alaric. The once eternal city, the former heart of the empire that had conquered the known world, fell to the Germanic invaders. How far mighty Rome had fallen! They’d called the city eternal, but nothing was eternal. All things will one day wither and die, no matter how mighty, how powerful or how invincible they may appear to be.   </em>
</p><p>
  <em>He witnessed Napoleon Bonaparte and his Grande Armee entering Moscow, only to find that the Russians had abandoned it to fire and ruin, leaving naught for Napoleon but ashes, just as they had done through every step of Napoleon's failed invasion of Russia. Rather than smashing the Russians in open battle as he had expected to, Napoleon had been lured into snowy Russia with no supplies available to him. His mighty Armee had been defeated not in a grand battle against a superior force who fought harder, but by snow and starvation.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>He witnessed famed musician John Lennon fatally shot outside the Dakota building in New York City. A man so revered and beloved, gunned down outside his home by a deranged fan who in his own mind believed he was doing the work of God and punishing a blasphemer. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>He witnessed two incredibly pretty blonde-haired children playing together. Their physical resemblances revealed them to be brother and sister. The brother, a golden-haired lad who looked to be about five years old, ran in circles around his sister but did not move quickly enough to shut her out of whatever game they were playing. She looked a year or so younger, but with her brother keeping his speed down she was able to catch up to him and tag him across the back. This led to him spinning around and wrapping his arms around her in a playful hug.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>They both looked up when their names were called, and an older woman walked towards them. It took time for his vision to reveal her to him, but once it did Paul recognized her immediately. He had seen her face many times before, and as the children broke their hug and ran into her waiting arms, Paul's distant memories and recollections of previous lives, previous civilizations and  previous planets was reduced to a single word.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Irulan.</em>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Sit the Throne</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Paul brings Irulan with him to the throne room as he meets with people, and she has to deal with people knowing and seeing her in her new role. (Paul/Irulan)</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Good morning, Irulan. I have good news; you’ll be joining me while I conduct some private audiences in the throne room today.”</p><p>“Fine,” Irulan said. She knew there was no point in arguing with Paul, as he was going to get his way regardless of how she felt or what she wanted. It was better to just go along with what he wanted.</p><p>"I don't need your advice on how to handle anything, of course," Paul went on. "But I'm confident your services will be valuable to me in other areas. You'll help me combat the tedium of such audiences, if nothing else."</p><p>Irulan's face paled, and she went from being resigned to panicking. She wasn't stupid; she knew what he was implying. It was one thing for her to be subjected to Paul's perverse desires while being restricted to her own chambers, but having to do it out in public, in the throne room, with an audience? She didn't know if she would be able to stand the humiliation.</p><p>Paul moved to her wardrobe and selected a dress for her to wear. He grinned as he held it out for her to take, but she did not share his enthusiasm. Her sense of dread only increased as she took the garment into her hands and examined it more closely. It was not the sort of dress she would have ever chosen to wear herself, especially for something like private audiences or matters of state. The dress had a deep slit in the skirt, which was made even more troubling given the confiscation of every undergarment she owned. She could already envision accidentally exposing herself to someone in this dress, and that was assuming Paul didn't bare her body to his audience deliberately while making use of her <em>services</em>.</p><p>"Well, get on with it," Paul said, nodding at her. "We don't want to keep our audience waiting, do we?"</p><p>--</p><p>Though the dress was technically covering everything that needed to be covered, Irulan still felt far too exposed as she walked by Paul's side as instructed. She could feel the eyes of the people on her as they walked towards the throne room, and her hearing was sharp enough to pick up plenty of muttering as well. That came as no surprise to her. She had no doubt that by now everyone in court knew what Paul had been up to with her over the last week and a half. Had it really been less than two weeks since this all began? It felt like a lifetime ago.</p><p>She felt like an animal on display, being gawked at in the dress with the deep slitted skirt that had her constantly conscious of the way she moved and how much skin she might be displaying, not to mention the damned collar around her neck. Paul surely heard the whispers and felt the stares just as she did, but he paid them no mind. He didn't look at her once as they walked, nor did he stop to converse with anyone along the way. He seemed to be lost in his own little world, and after they made it by another group of curious onlookers and it was just the two of them, Irulan could just make out Paul muttering to himself. Her curiosity overcame her own troubles for a moment and she strained to hear just what it was that her husband was mumbling.</p><p>“I’ll show you a place, high on the desert plain, where the streets have no name,” Paul mumbled to himself. Irulan cocked her head, not having the slightest clue what he was talking about. She nearly asked him what he was going on about, but her attention went elsewhere when she noticed they were entering the throne room.</p><p>"I want you to start out standing right over there," Paul said to her once they arrived in the throne room. She followed his finger to see that he was pointing at a little corner of the room behind his throne. It was on the raised dais with him, but if she stood where he told her to a large pillar would make sure that she would be concealed from view of anyone looking up at him from the other side. She would be invisible to anyone other than him, at least until he had her reveal herself.</p><p>She walked up the dais slowly and got into position behind the pillar while Paul took his seat on the Golden Lion Throne. It was just the two of them in the throne room for the moment, but she knew that wouldn't last long. It was only at that moment that Irulan realized she had no clue who Paul would be having an audience with today. She'd been so preoccupied with her too-revealing attire and the duties he'd hinted he would demand of her that she hadn't even considered that aspect of it. Just who would her husband be humiliating her in front of?</p><p>She couldn't see very well, not with how far away they were in the huge throne room and how awkward her vantage point was behind the pillar, but she could hear the doors open at the other end of the room. Irulan held her breath, resisting the urge to step out from behind the pillar to try and get a better look. Paul sat in his throne and said nothing, which only added to Irulan's suspense. She had to wait until the blurry and indistinct figure walked closer to the raised dais, and eventually said figure got close enough for Irulan to be able to make out her features from her vantage point behind the throne. When Irulan recognized just who was seeking an audience with Paul today, she recoiled in horror.</p><p>"Princess Wensicia," Paul said, nodding at her. "Welcome to Arrakeen."</p><p>--</p><p>"I am honored to be in your presence, my Emperor."</p><p>Wensicia spoke with the greatest cordiality and reverence, meaning not a word of it. This pretender to the throne had stolen away what rightfully belonged to her family. He'd stolen it from her father, but he wouldn't hold it forever. The Corrinos would take back their place on the throne, and Wensicia would be the one who made sure of it.</p><p>"The beloved sister of my wife is always welcome in these halls," Paul Atreides said, smiling back at Wensicia in a way that did not please her. He looked amused by her, as if he could see right through her and summarily dismissed her, and it enraged her. If he truly did look past her, he would live to regret it--though not for long, hopefully. "I understand you've only recently recovered from the birth of your first child?"</p><p>"Indeed," Wensicia said, and she offered a genuine smile at that. Farad'n was but three months old now, but Wensicia knew he would one day sit on the throne that this Atreides fraud had stolen from their family. It hadn’t been easy to get herself into this position, but her effort was going to eventually lead to the restoration of House Corrino to its proper glory. She would succeed where her older sister had failed.</p><p>“Congratulations,” the Emperor said. “I am sure he will grow into a fine man and a credit to you and your husband.” If she didn’t know him better she could almost believe that the smile on his face was sincere and he meant what he said. She wasn’t fooled though. She knew of his hatred for her family, and knew that he would not take kindly to any new Corrinos being born. He still did not trust them; he still viewed her family as a threat to his power. As well he should.</p><p>“So Dalak and I hope,” Wensicia said. They, and particularly she, hoped for far more than that, of course. Farad’n’s place was on that throne that this Atreides tyrant currently occupied, and Wensicia would live to see it happen. She would dedicate her life to making that day happen. Already she had done things in pursuit of this goal, irreversible things, things that she could never take back. And she did not regret any of it. She would do it all again in a heartbeat if it meant she would see her son restore House Corrino to its former and deserved glory.</p><p>“Yes, I suppose I owe you belated congratulations on your marriage as well,” Paul said. “You certainly moved quickly on getting pregnant, didn’t you?”</p><p>“Naturally,” Wensicia said. “That is the purpose of a marriage, after all.” Though she kept her tone pleasant, inside of her head she was delighted to take this shot at him. At first she’d honestly felt sorry for her older sister Irulan once it became clear that her husband had no intention of breeding with her, but her opinion had eventually shifted. Now Wensicia saw her sister’s failure as an opportunity for her. Paul Atreides refusing to father a child on Irulan opened the door for Wensicia to move forward with her own plans.</p><p>Her plans had received an unexpected complication upon her recent arrival in Arrakeen. Rumors had already spread well beyond the palace itself about the recent changes in Paul Muad’Dib’s personal life and who he spent his time with. As with most rumors it was difficult to separate fact from fiction, but the two constants in every version of the story she’d heard had been that his Fremen concubine had left the city and Paul had claimed his actual wife in her absence. </p><p>This complicated Wensicia’s purpose, but no matter what the truth between Paul and Irulan might be, she wasn’t about to give up now. She’d had to think quickly to modify her original plan to accommodate this new information, but the ultimate end goal remained the same. It would be her child Farad’n who would succeed Atreides and return the Corrinos to the throne, and Farad’n’s children and their children after them who would keep the dynasty going. There was no time to pity Irulan, not when continuing the Corrino dynasty fell to her now.  </p><p>“Is that truly the purpose?” Muad’Dib asked, cocking his head at her. “I suppose that’s one way to look at it, though I find that there have been too many reasons for marriage to count throughout history, and a pressing need to procreate is but one of them. Still, I think I can understand why you and your husband saw fit to get to work on breeding so quickly. After all, your sister Chalice did so tragically young. Such a shame. I know Irulan grieved for her, and I can’t imagine how it must have affected you.”</p><p>“Yes, I grieved for her as well,” Wensicia said, refusing to rise to the obvious implication made. There was honestly a bit of truth to it; she really had grieved for Chalice’s death. It was regrettable that she had to die for Wensicia to be able to rise up as their father’s heir, but there would be no looking back.</p><p>“I’m sure that you did,” Paul said, nodding. “My sympathies are with you, truly, and I also genuinely wish you, your husband and your new son well.” Wensicia didn’t buy a word of it, but she nodded along and thanked him all the same. “But as much as I would love to exchange pleasantries with my wife’s sister, you aren’t the only person who desires an audience with me today. What business brought you all the way out here to see me in person mere months after the birth of your son?”</p><p>“I come on behalf of my family,” she said formally. “I come to ask for a portion of our former CHOAM holdings, which were previously paid to House Atreides as my sister Irulan’s dowry, to be returned to us.”</p><p>“And why would I consider granting this request?” Paul asked mildly, studying her.</p><p>“Emperor or not, you are bound by the same terms as any other Great House,” Wensicia said. “Like any other marriage between two Great Houses, a dowry was paid to you on the expectation that you would impregnate your wife and continue both lines, or at the very least you would attempt to do so. But, and I say this with great respect for you, Emperor: you have not fulfilled this basic expectation. You have made no secret of the fact that you have no intention of ever attempting to father children with Irulan. Thus, I believe even you would have to admit that your marriage to my sister was agreed to on a false basis.”</p><p>“Interesting.” She couldn’t tell what Paul Atreides was thinking, and she didn’t like it. “And what do you intend to do if I don’t agree to your request?”</p><p>“We are only asking for a restoration of a certain percentage of our former holdings,” Wensicia said. “If you refuse, I will go to the Landsraad and lodge a complaint against House Atreides in an attempt to get the entirety of our holdings returned to us.”</p><p>--</p><p>“I see.”</p><p>Paul did see, and if he was honest he was not very impressed, not with Wensicia or with the arguments she was presenting. The familial resemblance between Wensicia and her sister was readily apparent. Both sisters had the same golden hair and were very beautiful, as would be expected after generations of carefully selected breeding by the Bene Gesserit. Paul quickly decided that Irulan was the fairer of the two though. Wensicia was shorter than her older sister, and while she was shapely, her breasts were slightly smaller than Irulan’s as well. Irulan was much more beautiful from Paul’s point of view. And despite knowing that his wife was older than her sister by three years, he believed that if someone who had no prior knowledge were asked to guess, they would assume that Wensicia was the older of the two.</p><p>Her arguments were no more impressive to him than she herself was. “There is no legal basis that argues for a marriage’s validity being dependent on whether the husband and wife intend to have children together,” he said. “After all, the Bene Gesserit knew full well that your husband’s cousin Count Fenring was sterile when they married Lady Margot off to him.” Wensicia frowned at that, unable to argue his point, and he grinned in response. “House Corrino did not agree to this marriage, as well as the CHOAM holdings that served as its dowry, for any reason other than to spare your father’s life.”</p><p>Wensicia wasn’t even pretending to hide her annoyance any longer. The niceties had faded and they were speaking frankly to each other now, or more frankly than they had been until now at the very least. Paul was happy to have reached this point.</p><p>“But if I’m being honest, I don’t think you are stupid enough to believe this line of argument would ever work. I believe you had a different intention in coming to Arrakis. You came to try and get me to hand back a portion of your former CHOAM holdings on the basis that I had not consummated my marriage to your sister. <em>That </em>is an argument that could potentially raise questions about the validity of my marriage.”</p><p>There was no way anyone in the Landsraad would actually <em>listen</em> to Wensicia if she lodged a complaint about this anyway. All of the Great Houses were terrified of his Fedaykin paying them a visit should they wind up on his bad side.</p><p>“But then you arrived here, and I’m sure you heard the rumors about me deciding to claim my wife at last. That forced you to change your argument at the last second,” he declared.</p><p>“And have you?” Wensicia asked, challenging him. “Rumors are rumors, but since you brought it up I’ll ask you directly. Have you consummated your marriage to my sister?”</p><p>Paul grinned. This was the moment he’d been waiting for. Now it was time for him to have his fun. “I have, as a matter of fact,” he said. “Now there are no longer any questions surrounding the legality of my marriage. But I understand that you might not be willing to take me at my word on something this important, so I’m willing to demonstrate the truth for you to see with your own eyes. Irulan, come to me now.”</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan had been watching the tense audience between her husband and her sister with a feeling of dread, and that feeling had only increased when the conversation shifted to a discussion of the consummation of their marriage, After the last week and a half at his mercy she had some idea of what to expect from Paul at this point, and she had seen his summons coming.</p><p>She answered the call as she was bidden, studiously not looking in her sister’s direction and heading straight for Paul on the throne. She stopped in front of him, waiting for the command she knew was coming. He was about to use her sexually in the throne room right in front of her sister. The only question was how.</p><p>“Attend to your duties, wife,” Paul said. “Get down on your knees, pull my cock out and suck my cock.”</p><p>Irulan was mortified. Irulan was humiliated. Irulan did what was demanded of her. She dropped to her knees in front of the throne, got Paul’s cock out and went to work. She’d sucked him often enough by now that it was almost second nature to her at this point. This was the first time she’d sucked him on the throne though, and obviously she’d never done it in front of anyone else, let alone her own sister.</p><p>But Irulan did what was expected of her. Doing her best to ignore her sister and her own humiliation, she took Paul’s cock between her lips and began to suck.</p><p>--</p><p>Wensicia watched her sister take the penis of Paul Atreides between her lips with disgust, with shock, and with indignation. This was an insult to Irulan, but more importantly it was an insult to her and to House Corrino.</p><p>The thing that upset her most of all was the uncontrollable reaction of her own body to what she was witnessing. She could feel the wetness growing in the white silk underwear she’d worn for the occasion as she unwillingly got aroused from watching her own sister go down on the emperor in his throne.</p><p>It was times like these that Wensicia wished she could turn her brain off. She couldn’t help but notice the size of Paul’s cock, and she also couldn’t help but acknowledge that he was far, <em>far </em>bigger than her husband. She had been a virgin when she married, and Paul Atreides’ cock was the only one she had ever seen in the flesh aside from her husband’s. She hated that she couldn’t even pretend her Dalak was a match for him in this area. She also hated that she watched and wondered what it felt like for Irulan to fit that much cock inside of her mouth. That was not a question that should have ever entered her mind, yet she could think of little else.</p><p>Wensicia had rarely felt so discomfited in her life, and she doubted that Irulan was very comfortable with this either, unless her older sister had changed far more than Wensicia could have imagined. Paul alone seemed perfectly fine with what was happening. Once Irulan got to work and started bobbing her head on his cock, he looked over at Wensicia once again.</p><p>“You are in no position to make demands of me, princess,” he said. “As you can see, Irulan and I have indeed consummated our marriage. Your family has no legal grounds with which to expect the return of a single share of your former CHOAM holdings. You can see what Irulan and I get up to on a daily basis. If we’re quiet, you can probably hear it as well.”</p><p>He went silent, and Wensicia held her breath to find out if he was right. He was; she could hear Irulan slurping around his cock as her blonde head bobbed and took him deeper. She sounded like a whore as far as Wensicia was concerned, but that didn’t stop her own arousal from continuing to grow.</p><p>--</p><p>“I still won’t be breeding with Irulan, however,” Paul said. “My concubine Chani will be the only one who may father my heir. Your sister is just a toy for my amusement, but that makes no difference as far as the legality of our marriage is concerned.”</p><p>Wensicia looked scandalized at the idea that he would fuck Irulan but not attempt to put a child in her, and that he would refer to her as just a toy. Irulan wasn’t affected at all by his pronouncement, but there was no reason for her to be. She already knew what his intentions with her were and how he thought of her, so there was nothing that came as a surprise. She kept right on sucking his cock, and he had to admit she was doing a damn good job of ignoring her sister’s presence. Or maybe Wensicia being there was even inspiring her, who knew?</p><p>Paul couldn’t say he wasn’t affected though. The words had left his lips easily enough, but as he informed Wensicia that he would not be impregnating Irulan and would only have children with Chani, a vision of Irulan brushing a little girl’s blonde hair carefully with a loving smile on her face rose unbidden in his mind. The vision impacted him more than he could have expected. He had to swallow deeply around a sudden lump in his throat, but he was determined not to let either woman see that anything was amiss.</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan was not able to ignore her sister’s presence. With every bob of her head, every time she swallowed him all the way down her throat or played with his balls, she was readily aware that Wensicia was there, watching and no doubt judging both her and Paul quite harshly. She was sucking her husband’s cock on his throne while her sister watched, and she was not able to take her mind off of the fact for even a second.</p><p>What shocked her was how she reacted to the knowledge that Wensicia was there, watching and judging her. Irulan should have been disturbed to be in this position, but that was not the prevailing emotion rushing through her. There was shame and humiliation there, yes, but there was a part of her that <em>enjoyed </em>sucking Paul’s cock while her arrogant, bitchy, least favorite sister watched. And it wasn’t a small part of her. Had she really become so depraved a creature in so short an amount of time?</p><p>Irulan didn’t particularly want to examine those thoughts too closely right now. She was afraid of the answers she might find if she allowed herself to dwell too much on how she was feeling. She did her best to just focus on sucking Paul’s cock. The more attention she put on that the faster she could make him cum, and the faster she could make him cum the quicker her humiliation would be over with.</p><p>She had the skills to make it happen, too. Her Bene Gesserit training had allowed her to do an excellent job pleasing him even that first night, when she’d been sucking not just his cock for the first time but sucking her first cock period. But she had only gotten better since then. Paul had seen to that, making sure she got plenty of practice sucking his cock, and so she knew exactly what she needed to do to please him. She kept bobbing, licking, slurping and stroking, and soon enough she got Paul ready to finish. The only question was how he would choose to do so, which of course was not something she had any say in. She just waited for him to make his decision.</p><p>--</p><p>If Wensicia thought that this had been a disrespectful audience so far, the ending served as an even greater affront to her honor, Irulan’s honor and more importantly the honor of House Corrino. Paul put his hands on Irulan’s hair, yanking it and pulling her in, holding her down on his cock with a familiarity that spoke to how often he had done this to her. If their physical relationship was as recent a development as the rumors claimed, they had been very busy over that short time.</p><p>Irulan did nothing to resist as her husband came inside of her mouth, and Wensicia could do naught but watch as a daughter of House Corrino was forced to swallow a man’s cum in the throne room. That the man was the Emperor as well as her husband was of little consolation. Not even someone of Paul Atreides’ stature should be desecrating the throne, not to mention common decency, in such a way!</p><p>“I trust that will suffice as proof of the physical nature of our marriage?” Paul said, raising an eyebrow at her as he waited for an answer. Wensicia scowled but nodded her head, because it wasn’t like she could do much else. How could you argue that Paul hadn’t consummated his marriage to her sister after an obscene public display like that?</p><p>“It is time for you to leave my presence now, princess,” Paul said dismissively. “I have many who desire an audience with me today, and I believe we have taken up enough of their time already.”</p><p>Wensicia was enraged by everything she had just seen as well as the casual dismissal, but she nodded stiffly, said her goodbyes and returned back from whence she came.</p><p>--</p><p>Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam waited her turn in the antechamber of the throne room impatiently. She despised sitting and being made to wait around like this, as if she was some common person instead of a Reverend Mother of the Bene Gesserit, but she knew her waiting had only just begun. There were several more faces seated around the antechamber all waiting their turn to have their own audience with Paul Atreides, and the Reverend Mother had already been informed that she would be the very last to be granted an audience that day. It went without saying that this was a blatant show of disrespect from this wretched Muad’Dib who had inflicted so much harm on generations of careful planning by the Sisterhood. Paul Atreides held a grudge against the Sisterhood, and her in particular and never missed a chance to show them disrespect. But Mohiam would endure this disrespect and sit and wait her turn, because she had no other choice.</p><p>It was really Irulan’s fault that she was here in the first place. As soon as Paul’s wife had informed the Sisterhood that she would no longer attempt to coax, seduce, manipulate or employ any other possible methods that might see an Atreides heir planted in her belly, Mohiam knew she would have to come to Arrakis so she could see Irulan in person and attempt to convince her to carry out her duty to the Sisterhood. This was far too important for the spoiled brat to waste because her precious feelings were hurt. Generations of selective breeding to create the Kwisatz Haderach, all threatened because the Lady Jessica disobeyed her duty to the Sisterhood for love of her Duke and gave him a son instead of a daughter!</p><p>Mohiam’s need to come to Arrakeen and investigate herself had hastened once the Bene Gesserit received the reports about Paul’s Fremen concubine leaving the city. And then shortly thereafter the rumors about Paul finally claiming his wife in the absence of his beloved concubine reached their ears, and Mohiam had to make this trip with all haste. Her distaste for this planet in general and for Paul Atreides in particular aside, it was vital that she come here and ascertain the truth for herself. Reports were no good here; she needed to confirm it for herself. If the rumors were true, the Sisterhood’s plan to breed Paul with Irulan was suddenly looking far more feasible.      </p><p>Mohiam looked up as Wensicia, the first appointment of the day, returned from her audience. The arrogant Corrino daughter had looked quite confident and pleased with herself when she left, but those emotions were nowhere to be found now. Now the woman looked furious. The petitioner due up second flinched and walked around Wensicia cautiously when she saw the look on the face of Shaddam’s daughter. Though the Sardaukar at her side might have had more to do with the intimidation factor, to be honest.</p><p>“I have never been so insulted in all my life!” the woman screeched. “<em>Damn </em>Paul Atreides!”</p><p>The others in the antechamber stepped back, giving the woman a wide berth after venom like that, especially when directed at Muad’Dib himself. Everyone else here either revered Paul Atreides or was deathly afraid of him, and in some cases it was both.</p><p>Mohiam regarded the woman dispassionately. She had never thought much of Wensicia Corrino. Irulan was a more recent disappointment, but she at least had shown promise in the beginning, which was why the Bene Gesserit took her on. Wensicia, on the other hand, had never been a candidate of any interest to the Sisterhood. The woman was not half as clever or as smart as she believed herself to be. She wondered if Wensicia believed that Chalice's death had been cleverly handled. While Mohiam may not have any actual evidence to confirm that Wensicia had had a hand in her sister's death, it wasn't exactly difficult to put the pieces together. Chalice died, and under obviously suspicious circumstances, and thus Wensicia became their father's heir. Even someone with far less smarts and common sense than the Reverend Mother could connect those dots easily enough.</p><p>“And what has you so angry, princess?” Mohiam asked. She alone was willing to speak with the woman, who otherwise was avoided by the others in the antechamber as if she had a disease of some sort.</p><p>“That <em>man </em>had the gall to order my sister to pleasure him with her mouth right there in the throne room during our audience!” Wensicia said. “And he made me <em>watch</em>!”</p><p>Mohiam raised an eyebrow at that. This was surprising behavior even from Paul Atreides, but she wasn’t concerned with Wensicia having her feelings hurt. The far more interesting piece of information there, at least for Mohiam’s purposes, was the confirmation that Paul and Irulan had indeed begun a physical relationship. The plan could still proceed.</p><p>She looked towards the door of the antechamber, wishing for the rest of these appointments to finish up already so she could get on with the important business of preserving over 10,000 years of Bene Gesserit work.</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan heard the footsteps retreat as yet another petitioner concluded their business with Paul and subsequently was sent on their way. How many people had been granted an audience with her husband already? She honestly had lost count quite some time ago, mainly because she had other things to focus on.</p><p>The indignity of being forced to suck his cock while he spoke with her sister remained the most 'memorable' (for lack of a better word) moment of the day, but it had not been an isolated incident. Every petitioner that had followed had been greeted by a similar scene. Every single person that had been granted an audience with Paul Muad'Dib today had also witnessed the emperor's wife sucking his cock while he sat on the throne. Irulan had been humiliated at first, but having already gone through it with Wensicia watching seemed to lessen the blow for every onlooker that followed. What did it matter if other people, most of whom she barely recognized and some she could never remember seeing or speaking to previously, watched her suck Paul's cock when she'd already done it in front of her own sister?</p><p>It had gotten easier the more she had to do it, both physically and in her own mindset. She barely even registered when another nameless face was there, looking on with wide eyes as she was summoned into action down on her knees. Her jaw was getting a bit sore, yes, but she had been put through worse by him. It helped that she could apply both the training she'd undergone and the considerable experience she had accumulated since then. She knew how to get Paul off, and the more frequently she got down on her knees and sucked his cock, the easier it became. He was largely being passive as well, letting her do all of the work while he spoke to whoever was visiting. It was a refreshing change of pace to be able to suck his cock without having him tug on her hair (at least not often) or forcing her to take him all the way down her throat and hold him there until she was gasping for air.</p><p>She sucked him time after time, by this point comfortable in the belief that she would be able to get through this. Surely the worst was over. She understood why he'd called her sister in first; it had shaken her right away. But he probably would have been better off building up to that if his goal here was humiliation, because getting Wensicia out of the way first had allowed her to settle in afterwards.</p><p>"Just one more appointment to go," Paul said, looking at her. "You're almost finished, Irulan."</p><p>She should have felt happy about that, but something in his eye concerned her. He didn't seem disappointed that she'd settled in and sucked him with greater ease after getting Wensicia out of the way. He looked amused, as if he knew something she didn't know. She'd been so sure that the worst was over and there was no one he could put in front of her that would match the shame of her sister, but what could he have in store for this final meeting?</p><p>"Send in the Reverend Mother," Paul said. Irulan felt her stomach drop.</p><p>--</p><p>"Welcome, Reverend Mother."</p><p>Paul didn't bother pretending that he was happy to see Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam. He disliked the Sisterhood, and to him this woman more than any other represented all that he hated. He also knew that Irulan had at least some level of fondness or respect for the woman, which was one of the reasons he'd made sure she would be his final visitor of the day. Making her wait and stew impotently in the antechamber was a happy bonus, but closing things out with the Reverend Mother forced to watch him make use of a former pupil was going to be a delight, at least for him.</p><p>"The great Paul Atreides has deigned to see me at last," she said, all but sneering at him. It was the least amount of respect any of today's petitioners had shown him, including even Wensicia and her blatantly false smiles. No doubt the Reverend Mother saw him as the boy who had ruined all of her Sisterhood's carefully laid plans simply by being born a boy, and he'd only made things more complicated for them since.</p><p>"Yes, I'm truly sorry you had to wait so long," he said, smirking to make it abundantly clear that he was not the least bit sorry in truth. They both knew it had been a deliberate decision on his part. "But what brings you here, Reverend Mother? I can't say I was expecting you."</p><p>She blathered on about some nonsense on a small, scarcely inhabited planet, and Paul's patience wore thin very quickly. It was patently obvious that she did not come all the way to Arrakeen to discuss something so inconsequential.</p><p>"Please spare me the falsehoods," he said, cutting her off. "I've had a long day, Reverend Mother, and I should like to get up out of this throne soon." Though not just yet, of course. There was still a bit of fun to be had before his final meeting concluded and he left the throne room behind. "Just tell me why you're really here."   </p><p>“As you wish, oh exalted one,” the Reverend Mother said, dropping all pretenses. “I came here to find out if the rumors are true and you are actually bedding your wife now.”</p><p>Paul nodded. He’d figured as much, but it was good to have her come out and admit it. Now he could get on with his response, which was why he’d wanted Irulan here in the first place. “Word spreads fast if you’ve come here so quickly, Reverend Mother,” he said. “It is a relatively recent development, but yes, the rumors are true. Irulan and I have become sexually involved.”</p><p>“After all this time? Still, better late than never, I suppose,” Mohiam said, shrugging. “But how do I know you speak truly?”</p><p>He smiled. “I’d be happy to show you the truth right now. Irulan, come to me.” That was why he’d brought her here. He had a feeling she had at least an inkling of what was about to happen. It was possible that the others had kept their mouths shut upon returning to the antechamber out of fear of him, but Wensicia likely hadn’t been so guarded. Mohiam more than likely knew she was about to witness an explicit demonstration of the change in his relationship with his wife. That didn’t make this any less fun for him. If anything it only excited him more. She might know what was coming, but that would just make it all the more rewarding when he angered her.</p><p>He could tell that Irulan was anxious again, for the first time since Wensicia had departed. She’d relaxed as time passed and she got more comfortable, but that had been his goal the entire time. Just when she’d settled in and relaxed, he’d called in the Reverend Mother to make her worry all over again.</p><p>She knew her job though, she knew what was expected of her, and she got to it quickly. She took his cock back into her mouth and began to suck it once again, and even though she’d repeated this same task time after time today, she did an excellent job of it once again. Maybe she wanted to end her embarrassment as quickly as possible, or maybe she wanted to prove to the Reverend Mother that she had not failed in her training. Whatever the case may be, Irulan sucked him as well as ever.</p><p>“She’s quite good at this,” Paul said, looking past his kneeling wife and smiling at Mohiam. “I suppose I have you and the rest of the Bene Gesserit to thank for that. You trained her up well, I have to admit it. But she’s only gotten better now that she’s had a chance to actually practice, of course. Instruction can only get you so far. There’s no real replacement for live experience, and Irulan has had plenty of that recently.”</p><p>“So I can see,” Mohiam said. Paul would give her credit where it was due; she did not show any outward sign of how she might be feeling about this. Wensicia had been blindingly obvious and easy to read whether she said a word or not, but Mohiam was far better at concealing her emotions. That wasn’t a huge shock to him. She was a Reverend Mother of the Bene Gesserit, after all. “The greater question on my mind isn’t whether or not you’re using her physically, however. What I want to know is whether or not you’re planning on finally breeding with your wife now.”</p><p>“I know you are,” Paul said. That was far and away the primary concern the Bene Gesserit had when it came to him. He represented a disruption to their breeding program, but he also represented the potential culmination of it. Their original plan had been ruined when his mother disobeyed their command and gave her Duke Leto a son rather than a daughter, but they could still save it if they could get a child from him, provided that child had the proper mother. Irulan was that mother. The Sisterhood wanted nothing more than to see him breed with Irulan. It was why the Reverend Mother had come all the way here. She’d heard a rumor that suggested he might be showing attention to Irulan now, and Mohiam had come here to find out if it was true, and if it would result in the offspring her and the Bene Gesserit so desired.</p><p>“Climb onto my lap, Irulan,” he said, looking down at his wife and ignoring the Reverend Mother’s question. He would let her stew without an answer for a bit longer, and hopefully break through her calm exterior in the process.</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan paused in her sucking, looking up at Paul pleadingly with his cock still in her mouth. This was a step beyond anything he’d demanded of her so far today, and it frightened her. Using her mouth on him in front of an audience was bad enough, but actually fucking him, and with no less than the Reverend Mother watching? It was too much!</p><p>She got no mercy from Paul, not that she’d honestly expected any. He raised his eyebrows at her, and she knew that if she did not obey him quickly there would be consequences. She shuddered to think how he might punish her, especially if he made the Reverend Mother watch it.</p><p>Knowing that she had no real alternative, Irulan let his cock drop out of her mouth, got to her feet and tugged his clothing farther down his legs so it would not be in the way of what was about to happen. There was no need for her to make any major adjustments with her dress, and obviously she didn’t have anything on underneath it so there was nothing to be removed. She just hiked her skirts up a bit, climbed onto his lap, wincing at the high probability that the Reverend Mother was getting an unexpected view of her nether region thanks to the slit in the skirt, and waited for him to tell her what came next. She knew what he was aiming for, of course, but she also knew that he would want to give the order.</p><p>“Take my cock inside of you,” he said. A glance at his face revealed that he was looking not at her but at the Reverend Mother. Part of her felt like she should be affronted that his focus was on someone else even as she took his cock in hand and positioned her hips to take him in, but she couldn’t say that she was surprised. He’d fucked her too many times to count by now, and who knew how many more times he would fuck her in the future? But fucking her in front of the Reverend Mother was not an experience he was likely to ever repeat, at least she hoped not, and so he wanted to watch closely for her reaction.</p><p>It shamed Irulan greatly to be used in such a way, a mere piece to be played in a game Paul was waging against the Reverend Mother, but it shamed her even more greatly that there was at least a part of her that actually reveled in it. Though she knew that she would be consumed with self-loathing for it later, there was undeniably a part of her that found it all the more exciting to sink down onto Paul’s cock and begin bouncing on his lap knowing that Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam was standing just behind her, watching it all.</p><p>--   </p><p>Paul enjoyed feeling Irulan rise and fall on him, taking his cock deep inside of her with every drop, just as he enjoyed it when she sat down on him and shook her hips from side to side, or rolled them in a circle. His wife had already been a great fuck when she first came to him, when he first claimed her, and had only become greater with every passing day and every time he paid her a visit. Sex with her was a true bright spot in his life, one of the few he had these days amidst the pressures of ruling, the gravity of the jihad and the absence of his beloved Chani, and doing so on the throne was an interesting new twist. But as nice as it felt, that was not the most interesting aspect of this for him right now.</p><p>Mohiam was skilled, he would give her that much. He doubted there were many who would even suspect she was upset based on her reaction, but Paul was not most people. He could tell that she was not pleased about being forced to watch her former pupil fuck him right in front of her, and if she thought she was displeased now, he was about to give her something she would like far less.</p><p>“As you can see, it is not just her mouth I make use of, but her entire body,” he said. His hands idly rested on Irulan’s perfect ass as she rode him, but the bulk of his attention remained on the Reverend Mother who had once tested him with a Gom Jabbar as a child. “Irulan is mine, mind and body. Every part of her is mine to use as I wish. But I shall make it clear to you that while some things have changed, others have not. I may make use of Irulan’s body now, but she will not bear my children. I take measures to make sure she will never get pregnant, and she never will. Just as I promised on the day I accepted the surrender of the previous emperor, it is Chani, and only Chani, who will bear me an heir.”</p><p>--</p><p>Mohiam heard Paul’s words, and they sounded certain enough. She doubted they were an act. Paul Atreides genuinely did not intend to ever breed with Irulan. But she was skeptical that he would actually be able to live up to his declaration. He could say what he want and say it with as much conviction as he could muster, but promises were made to be broken. After all, his mother had broken her promise to the Sisterhood by giving birth to him instead of a daughter who would then be married to a Harkonnen male as intended. And more importantly, Paul himself had previously promised he would never even touch his wife and would lay with Chani and Chani alone. He’d already broken that promise; why wouldn’t he break this one as well?</p><p>She kept those thoughts to herself. She could have reminded him of that broken promise and throw it in his face, but petty victories such as those were of little interest to her. It was something much greater that she sought, a greater prize that had brought her to this planet.</p><p>“Speaking of Chani, where is your beloved Fremen concubine?” Mohiam asked. “I understand she left the city shortly before you finally consummated your marriage with Irulan.”</p><p>“Where Chani has gone is none of your concern,” Paul said, and now it was his turn to grow annoyed. He’d been enjoying himself from the moment Irulan started bobbing her head on his cock, and it had only increased when he got her to climb onto his lap and start riding him, but Mohiam had managed to pierce his good mood. She was pleased with that little victory, but it still was not why she had come.</p><p>“Yes, of course,” she said, nodding. “Forgive me. But I do hope you have at least had word from her, to let you know when she plans on returning? Or failing that, to assure you that she is alright if nothing else?”</p><p>Paul refused to answer her and instead focused on the motions of Irulan’s voluptuous body on top of his. Mohiam felt he had still answered her question even in his silence though. She could only conclude that he had not heard from Chani, and if he hadn’t heard from her there was probably no set plan on when or even if she would return. Mohiam was now more convinced than ever that whatever had happened between Paul and his Fremen concubine, whatever drove her to leave Arrakeen, it was not a trifling matter. It was entirely possible that she would not return at all, and if that was the case it presented a tremendous opportunity for her, for Irulan and for the Sisterhood.</p><p>Chani had left, and in her absence Paul had broken his promise and begun to couple with his wife for the first time. If she stayed away for any length of time, his resolve would likely weaken. That weakness could be exploited by Irulan. She might finally have a chance to displace the concubine, get her husband to breed with her and salvage the Bene Gesserit breeding program after all.</p><p>This possibility required her to rethink everything. At one point the Sisterhood had considered trying to maneuver Paul into breeding with his own sister Alia as an alternative, but this was the more preferable option, and now it seemed that the opportunity was there.</p><p>There was another option that the Bene Gesserit had been weighing, but the possibility of salvaging the Atreides bloodline could not be ignored. The plot brewing against the Atreides Empire had at one point seemed like the best option the Sisterhood had to get what they wanted, or something approaching what they wanted at least, but she couldn’t consider it the preferable route now if this was a possibility. The Bene Gesserit may need to rethink getting involved in the conspiracy along with the Spacing Guild and the Tleilaxu. That could still be a contingency plan should Irulan fail, but there was no need to commit to it yet.</p><p>“I believe we have reached the end of our audience, revered Muad’Dib,” she said. “I shall not take up any more of your time, and allow you to get back to your pressing business.”</p><p>--</p><p>“Oh, don’t leave just yet, Reverend Mother,” Paul said, shaking his head and keeping her in place before she could make her exit. “Our business has not yet concluded.”</p><p>“Has it not?” She cocked her head at him. “I have discussed what I came to discuss with you. Do you wish for me to stay around and provide you with my company?”</p><p>“I wouldn’t say that.” He grinned at her and shook his head. “But I offered to show you proof that I am indeed making use of Irulan’s body now, and I believe it would be a poor demonstration if you did not stay around and witness the conclusion with your own eyes.”</p><p>In an ironic way, getting what she’d wanted seemed to irritate Mohiam more. Now that she had the information she’d come for, being held back and forced to watch more was a greater test of her patience. She had no desire to watch Irulan ride him, and that of course made him want to keep her in there to do that very thing for as long as he possibly could.</p><p>He went out of his way to make that happen, putting his hands on Irulan’s hips and coaxing her into a more leisurely ride that he would be able to withstand for a greater length of time. She wasn’t happy about it, but she took the hint and slowed her pace down.</p><p>Paul’s eyes went back and forth between Irulan and Mohiam. It was humorous to watch the Reverend Mother’s annoyance grow the longer she was forced to stand and watch the former Bene Gesserit pupil bounce on his lap, but it was becoming increasingly harder to pull his eyes away from his gorgeous wife. Even while still fully clothed (well, mostly clothed at least), her body still called out to him. She truly was the most beautiful woman he’d ever met, and based on the memories he possessed might very well have been the most beautiful woman who had ever existed. It was a delight to watch her body undulate on him, and she did it so well.</p><p>Nothing had ever felt as good as sex with Irulan. It felt like a betrayal to think it, but it was the truth. He loved Chani dearly, and sex with her was great, but it wasn’t even fair to compare the two. Chani was not the result of thousands of years of careful breeding, and she had not received the sort of training that Irulan had.</p><p>He resolved to put Chani out of his mind, at least while Irulan was gyrating on his cock. His lover was gone, at least for now, so it was his wife who he had turned to and his wife who he would enjoy for the time being.</p><p>It felt great, and knowing that Gaius Helen Mohiam was forced to stand there and watch it made it feel that much better. But he wouldn’t be able to hold out forever, and he didn’t want to either. While he’d enjoyed the blowjobs she’d given him throughout the day, now he was ready for something bigger. He was ready for the orgasm she was going to wring out of him.</p><p>He wanted to bring her with him at the same time; wouldn’t that be a fitting final vision for the Reverend Mother to see before he sent her on her way? It was possible his cock alone could get her there, but why take any risks? He slid his hand in between their bodies and rubbed at her clit with his fingers, playing her, stroking her, teasing her. He was quickly rewarded for his efforts when he heard Irulan begin to moan and move her body with greater force and urgency. Whatever she might think of him and however she might feel about him using her, she couldn’t resist the pleasure he was drawing out of her.</p><p>Amusingly, it was Irulan who finished first. She cried out, her pleasure obvious to him as well as to the Reverend Mother, and her body tightened around him as she hit orgasm. That was all that Paul needed. He dug his hands into her ass cheeks and gave her a squeeze as she forced him over the edge right after her.</p><p>“That’s it, Irulan,” he said with a groan. “That’s it. Take it. Take all of it, wife.” Though he was sure the Reverend Mother understood what was happening and what he was doing perfectly well, he wanted to leave no doubt. He wanted her to understand that he was cumming inside of his wife. He wanted her to see it for herself. And he wanted her to know that despite this, nothing would come of it. He could cum in his wife as many times as he wanted, day after day after day, but he still would not ever father a child with her. He would keep this promise to Chani.</p><p>He shook off the persistent visions of children with Irulan’s golden hair, and tried to enjoy the finality of claiming and cumming inside of his wife while making the Reverend Mother watch.</p><p>--</p><p>“You did a good job today,” Paul said as they left the throne room behind. “You followed my commands quite well, and you put on a show that no one who joined us in the throne room will ever forget.”</p><p>“I don’t doubt it,” Irulan said tonelessly. Who would ever forget watching the emperor’s wife sucking him off while he sat on the throne, or in the Reverend Mother’s case, climbing on top of him and riding him in the throne? It was something shameful, something obscene, something that wasn’t even fit for the lowest concubine, never mind a daughter of Shaddam Corrino, a Bene Gesserit and the emperor’s wife. He obviously expected her to be pleased. The worst part was that there was at least a part of her that <em>was</em>, humiliation aside.</p><p>“Since you did so well, I am going to give you a reward,” he said, and that made her stop and turn to look at him.</p><p>“A reward?” she said. What kind of reward?” Irulan’s mood brightened a bit, but only a bit. She was wary of this; wary that it could be a trap or trick of some kind. She feared what his twisted mind might conjure up as a <em>reward</em>.</p><p>“I’m going to allow you back on the council,” he said. “You’ve done well enough at accepting your new station that I feel it’s safe to restore this privilege to you.”</p><p>“I see.” Irulan exhaled slightly. That wasn’t so bad; it was an <em>actual </em>reward even. She still didn’t know if anyone on the council would actually listen to her. They hadn’t been very inclined to do so before, and that was when she had been Paul’s wife in name only who went ignored while he spent all of his time with his Fremen concubine. She had his attention now, and the entire court knew about it, but would that work in her favor? She had a feeling that the other council members would be even <em>less </em>likely to listen to the thoughts of a woman whose primary role was now to be the emperor’s personal sex toy. Still, it was something. Maybe her words could reach Paul and sway his thinking on occasion, if nothing else. She might be able to do some good and contribute something beyond writing her histories.</p><p>“That’s not all,” he said, and the wariness returned immediately. “I am also going to give you the night off. Enjoy your rest, write your histories, or do whatever it is you wish to do with your free time.”</p><p>“Oh.” Whatever she’d been expecting the second piece of his ‘reward’ to be, that had not been it. But she could use it. He’d used her several times a day every day for the last week and a half, and a night off was in its own way an even more valuable reward than the restoration of her council position. She didn’t say thank you, because she didn’t believe he deserved a thank you for this, but she was glad for it all the same.</p><p>“I’ll leave you to make your own way back to your chambers,” he said. “I have things I must attend to anyway.”</p><p>With that he was gone, and Irulan was left alone for what felt like the first time in weeks. She could see her way back to her chambers well enough, but navigating her way through her feelings was tougher.</p><p>Irulan’s brain was a mass of confused, jumbled feelings and conflicted emotions. She couldn’t figure out how to feel or what to think about either the predicament she was in or the husband who put her there. She should hate every second of it, and she should have nothing but hate in her heart for Paul. After what he’d put her through for the last week and a half, as well as today, she should despise him and curse his very existence.</p><p>But did she, truly? Could she honestly say that she hated every bit of this, of what Paul forced her to do? As much as she knew she <em>should</em>, she thought about the way her body felt when she got really into it, and the little thrill that went through her when he made her do something particularly dirty. Did she hate that? Was the humiliation and degradation she was now going through really worse than the isolation she’d been in and the loneliness she’d felt before her husband started visiting her?</p><p>These were questions Irulan struggled to answer, even over the course of a long night free from her husband’s attention. </p>
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<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Travels and Deceptions</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Paul and Irulan venture outside of Arrakeen for a memorable day, and a night that will have massive ramifications for Paul’s entire empire.</p>
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  <em>Paul stood in the crowd and watched, transfixed as this man delivered his impassioned speech from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. He experienced the speech as vividly as he would have had he actually been there, even though this man from ancient Earth's name had been all but forgotten in Paul's time. Paul, however, did not forget. This man had become a revered figure in his time, and as Paul listened to his speech there was little wonder as to why.</em>
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  <em>"I have a dream today! I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; "and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together."</em>
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  <em>Paul knew the words; they were part of his memory. ALL of this was part of his memory. That did not stop him from listening intently and absorbing every syllable.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>"Free at last! Free at last!</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"</em>
</p><p>
  <em>When Dr. King's famed speech ended, Paul's dreams shifted into a different ancestral memory. This one was from several decades later, and while decades and a single human lifespan or two were a completely insignificant amount of time in the larger scope of the universe, much had changed among the human race in that relatively short span of time. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Paul was not standing on his own two feet this time as he had been during Dr. King's speech but instead was being carried on the back of a human male. The human did not appear to be old; he couldn't have even been out of his teens yet. That he could easily carry Paul, or the person through whom Paul was viewing the memory to be more precise, spoke to how light his cargo must be.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>They were walking through some woods, but the closer Paul looked at his surroundings the more certain he became that something was off here. The trees and the water seemed real enough at first glance, but there was a certain false quality to them. After reflecting on it for a bit he came to the conclusion that these memories had actually taken place inside of a fully virtual world. Such a thing had not existed in reality since the Butlerian Jihad, but Paul’s range of memories were not limited by the paths humanity had taken over their generations and eras. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>They were traveling through the woods pursuing a story, and Paul could feel the fright of the person whose memory he was occupying as their companion mentioned the woodcrafter who had seen a monster, or a ghost; some sort of white shadow. Paul found the very idea preposterous, but he felt the fear through the memory regardless.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“L-L-Let me down!” the feminine voice cried, and then she flipped off of the boy’s shoulders and onto her feet.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“What is it?” he asked.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>There was a pale girl there, and she fell lifeless to the ground.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>There was confusion from not only the male companion who was apparently named Kirito (or perhaps that was only a name he had assumed inside of this virtual world) but also the girl whose memory this was as to why this small girl had no cursors or icons as someone inside of the world should have had, and why they were able to move her and bring her back to their home with them. It was obvious that this girl did not fit the ordinary circumstances of the world she resided in.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>The child woke some time later, and they learned her name was Yui.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“I don’t know anything,” Yui said when Asuna, whose memory this was, asked her why she had been in the forest and where her parents were. But Paul knew, or at least assumed, and the more he watched them interact with her the more confident he became in his assumption.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Yui did not have parents, not really. She didn’t know why she’d been in the forest because she was not meant to know. She was not the little human girl inside of a virtual world. Even though they were in a virtual world, Paul could feel the humanity of Kirito and of Asuna, but it was not there for Yui. She was not a human but rather a thinking machine. This was most interesting.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Paul was intrigued to see where Kirito and Asuna’s adventures took them, and whether or not they would learn what Yui actually was. He decided to spend some more time here and explore these memories a bit more. </em>
</p><p>--<br/><br/></p><p>"Get up," Paul said, putting a hand on Irulan's shoulder and shaking her awake roughly. She opened her eyes blearily, and when consciousness returned to her more fully she watched and waited to see what sexual demand he would make of her this morning. Being woken up so he could get an early morning blowjob or roll her over and fuck her before he went about his day was so commonplace by this point that she barely batted an eye.</p><p>But no commands came, and there was no cock slapping down on her cheek or sliding inside of her body as soon as she opened her eyes. In fact Paul was fully dressed and did not seem to be making any move to change that fact.</p><p>"What do you require of me?" she asked, confused as to why he would be shaking her awake if not for sex.</p><p>"Your presence," he said. He pointed to a stillsuit that he'd brought in and placed on her vanity. "We're heading out to the desert this morning, so put that on. You can take your collar off this time, given the obvious circumstances."</p><p>Irulan nodded and got to her feet. She didn't know why Paul was heading out into the desert or why he wanted her to go along with him, but she was used to obeying his commands by this point. It was a bit unsettling to have such a different set of responsibilities today, if she was being honest with herself, but there wasn't much she could do about it. She would just have to go along with him and find out what strange surprises he had in store for her today.</p><p>She reached behind her and removed the collar, and looked down at it curiously once it was off. Irulan could remember the anger that ran through her when he first showed her this collar and told her she would be wearing it at all times unless given permission to take it off by him. That permission came very rarely, and when it did the collar was usually only off for a brief window of time. The thick collar had been a heavy and unwelcome weight for her at first, but she'd grown so accustomed to having it on at all times that her body felt unnaturally light with it removed.</p><p>Not wanting to examine that too closely, Irulan hurried to get herself ready. Paul grew somewhat irritated with her for not putting her stillsuit on to his proper satisfaction, but in her defense she had never had to survive out in the desert as he had for so long in between her father and Baron Harkonnen's plot to wipe out the Atreides threat and Paul's rise to depose her father with the help of his Fremen followers.</p><p>The man the Fremen still called Muad'Dib made sure Irulan's stillsuit was applied properly, and then they left her quarters. Several of Paul's Fedaykin flanked them as they walked through the palace and made their way onto an ornithopter. The small transport vessel took to the air, and it wasn't long before they flew above the Shield Wall.</p><p>It was at this point that Irulan began to get truly concerned. She'd known Paul would have some kind of surprise to spring on her, else why would he have bothered to have her come along, but now she began to fear that he might be taking her to visit Chani. Though it was Paul and not Irulan who had initiated every single encounter the two of them had had in her absence, Irulan didn't know if Chani would be rational about it and accept that it had been Paul who forced all of this upon her. And even if she <em>did </em>accept that Irulan was not at fault for Paul breaking his promise to sleep with Chani and only Chani, all he needed to do was let slip that Irulan had been feeding Chani contraceptives. Knowing that Irulan had actively been preventing her from getting pregnant would surely draw Chani's ire far more than Paul's broken promise.</p><p>"May I ask where we are going?" Irulan said quietly. She wasn't going to beg and she wasn't going to let on why she was asking, but she wanted to get at least some information out of him so she could mentally prepare herself as best she could.</p><p>"We are not going to be seeing Chani today," Paul said, anticipating the path Irulan's mind had taken and answering the question she hadn't dared to ask. Irulan relaxed with that assurance, but only slightly. He still had <em>something </em>in mind, Chani or no Chani. "We will actually be visiting a certain sietch you may be familiar with. Sietch Ashar."</p><p>“Yes,” Irulan said simply. Naturally she was familiar with it, and even if she hadn’t been before she certainly would have familiarized herself with it after recent events. “It’s the sietch run by Imam, the uncle of Haatim.”</p><p>“Exactly,” Paul said. “I’m going to try and reconcile with Imam, who isn’t exactly thrilled with me after I ordered his nephew’s execution. Understandable, I suppose. Haatim more than earned his punishment, but blood is still blood.”</p><p>“I see,” Irulan said, but it was only partially true. Obviously she understood why Paul would make the effort to repair his relationship with Imam. Imam was not the most influential of the Naibs and his sietch was not the biggest or strongest, but it would still be worthwhile to try and get back on good terms with him. This part of Paul’s effort made perfect sense.</p><p>It was the other part of it that she couldn’t figure out. Why had he brought <em>her </em>along? Even if he had done it solely to scare or embarrass her, her presence there was only going to complicate things and make Imam less likely to be in a forgiving mood towards Paul. It was not a secret that Irulan had been strongly in favor of executing Haatim, and had in fact been the first member of the council to make the suggestion even if it had only been when Gurney Halleck arrived and pushed for the same punishment that it actually moved forward.</p><p>“You realize my presence there will only make things harder for you, don’t you?” she asked. Paul smiled and shook his head.</p><p>“Let me worry about that,” he said, and Irulan let the matter drop. She couldn’t see what he hoped to gain by bringing her along to his meeting with Imam, but her husband’s mind worked in ways she knew she would never really be able to comprehend. Whatever he had in mind, she would find out soon enough.</p><p>While they rode Irulan thought about her current standing in Arrakeen. She had recently returned to council meetings as promised by Paul, but her opinions were being given no more weight than before. Her return a couple of days ago had led to a rather awkward meeting where Alia and others showed her the same lack of respect they always did before, and Korba had been even more openly disrespectful and dismissive of her than he had been before. If Irulan had to place a wager on it, she would bet that Korba had been the one to leak the fact that she had spoken out and suggested that Haatim deserved to be executed. He bore watching, that one.</p><p>Once they made it several leagues south of the Shield Wall, the ‘thopter suddenly landed. Irulan looked around in confusion, seeing nothing but desert surrounding them. This was not Imam’s sietch.</p><p>“Why have we stopped here?” she asked, looking at Paul for answers. “This isn’t anywhere near Sietch Ashar.”</p><p>“No, it’s not,” he agreed. “We’ll be visiting somewhere else first. Just you and I; the Fedaykin will go ahead without us in the ‘thopter.”</p><p>Irulan was even more confused now, but she allowed Paul to herd her out of the transport vehicle and onto the desert. “But how are we supposed to get where we’re going?” she asked. “Or better yet, how are we supposed to get from there to the sietch without a ‘thopter?”</p><p>As if to drive her point home, the ‘thopter took off not long after she finished her sentence. Paul didn’t look concerned though.</p><p>“I’m going to summon a Maker,” he said, looking straight ahead rather than at her.</p><p>To say that Irulan was disturbed would be an understatement. “How am I supposed to ride a sandworm?” she asked. “I have absolutely no experience.” She knew her panic was obvious in her voice, and she didn’t care in that moment. For a second or two she almost considered the possibility that Paul was trying to get her killed so she would be out of the way when Chani came back, but she dismissed that thought immediately. There were far simpler ways for him to remove her from his life if that was his intention.</p><p>“I’m going to summon a worm from over there,” he pointed at a spot a little ways off, “using a thumper. If you go and stand on that dune,” he pointed to a dune that was fairly high up, “I’ll navigate the worm so it’ll pass directly below you. You can then jump down onto its back once I pass by on the worm and I’m level with you.”</p><p>It was not a plan Irulan was very enthusiastic about, but it wasn’t like she had much choice in the matter. The ‘thopter was gone and she had no other means of getting around, so she would have to get into position and trust that her husband knew what he was doing. He <em>had </em>lived in the desert among the Fremen for years before becoming emperor, so hopefully his old skills had not left him.</p><p>Irulan went up to the dune Paul had pointed to and stood in wait. Once she was in position Paul placed down the thumper and summoned the worm that would apparently serve as their tool to travel wherever it was they were going. Every second that passed without a worm appearing felt like an eternity for Irulan, who was extremely aware of how out of her element she was out here in the desert.</p><p>It actually didn’t take very long for the worm to appear though. It had only been a few minutes before her husband succeeded in his effort and his target appeared. And it was a big one. Irulan didn’t have the experience with sandworms that the Fremen did, but she was knowledgeable enough to recognize that this was a very large worm. Her anxiety spiked once again. Would he actually be able to handle this thing? If he couldn’t, it would mean Irulan’s death one way or the other. Either the worm followed up killing Paul by killing her as well, or she simply died in the desert. And even if she somehow made it out on her own, she wouldn’t live long after that. If she returned to Arrakeen telling a tale of Muad’Dib being killed by a sandworm, execution would be her only reward.</p><p>Paul was not just an Atreides or the man who had ended her family’s empire though. He was also Fremen, in practice if not by birth, and he had the skills of a Fremen. He used his hooks skillfully and got on board the massive worm, then was able to use his control to navigate the worm over in her direction just as he’d promised he would. Paul and his ride passed directly below her, and Irulan knew her time to act was now. She swallowed her fear and took her leap.</p><p>She managed to get on board the worm behind Paul, and she grabbed onto her husband’s back for support. Paul did not turn towards her; he was obviously busy navigating the worm and making sure it went in the direction he wanted it to go. Irulan still had no clue where they were going or why, but for the moment she was just happy to have succeeded in getting on top of the worm.</p><p>Irulan shook in fear as their ride began, but once the initial terror faded and her mind adjusted to the reality that she was not in imminent danger of dying, she found that it wasn’t such a bad way to travel after all. She had never expected to ride a sandworm in her life, and had never had any desire to do so, but now that she was doing it she was glad for the experience. Riding on the back of the massive worm while it moved through the desert was actually rather thrilling. It gave her a feeling of power, and she imagined this was a far more acute feeling for Paul since he was the one actually controlling the worm and dictating where it went.</p><p>“Would you answer a question for me, Irulan?” Paul asked not long into their ride. “Not as my wife or the daughter of Shaddam or a Bene Gesserit witch, but as a historian?” It took a few seconds for his question to get through to Irulan, who had been wholly caught up in the surprising excitement of riding a sandworm for the first time.</p><p>“What is it?” she asked. It seemed like an odd time to ask a question about history, but she was quite proud of her work as a historian. If he had any questions in that area, she would answer them to the best of her ability.</p><p>“As a historian, what do you know of the Butlerian Jihad?”</p><p>Irulan was quick to summarize what had happened. “There was a war between those humans who supported the use of thinking machines, and even thought humanity should evolve to become more like them, and those who felt the machines had become too advanced and dangerous. The latter side won the war, and after the Battle of Corrin, all thinking machines and sophisticated computers were destroyed. This led to the formation of the Spacing Guild, CHOAM, and various other major political institutions.”</p><p>“Spoken like a true historian,” Paul said, and though his back was to her she could hear the smile in his voice. “But what do you think of the Great Revolt? Was it a good thing for humanity and for the universe, or was it a bad thing?”</p><p>Irulan paused in her answer to give that question the consideration it deserved. Most people would immediately say that the Butlerian Jihad had been a necessary and just cause, and that humanity had been right to destroy all intelligent machines it had built, but she could sense that Paul did not want her to merely regurgitate commonly held beliefs. He was asking for her thoughts as a historian, as one who had studied the distant past of humanity far more diligently than most.</p><p>“I think it is impossible to be certain whether it was the right decision for humanity or not,” she said eventually. “Obviously it led to a large technological reversal of the human race. Generations of knowledge and advancements were lost, and the commandment to never again make a machine in the likeness of a human mind has held us back from ever regaining that which was lost. But if intelligent machines had been allowed to remain, what would the long-term effects have been? Might they have led to the outright destruction of the human race? Many would argue so.”</p><p>“Many would,” Paul acknowledged. “Just about everyone would, in fact. But I have serious doubts about whether it was a good thing or not. There’s an ancient saying about history being written by the victors, and that’s the case here too. Essentially all of the information we still have about those times comes from those who stood for the destruction of thinking machines. The destruction of the Galactic Net led to untold knowledge of humanity’s history prior to the Jihad being lost, but it runs much deeper than that. It’s amusing to think that in ancient days people found the destruction of the Library of Alexandria to be a tragedy. If only those people could have known how much more knowledge would have been lost when man decided to destroy its greatest creation.”</p><p>“But you said it runs even deeper than the lost knowledge?” Irulan asked. She didn’t need to ask him about the destruction of the Galactic Net or what it had been, like nearly anyone else alive would have. Irulan was a dedicated historian, and she knew exactly what he was talking about. She was far more interested in what he seemed to consider a much bigger problem than the knowledge and technology humanity had lost.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s right there in the word, isn’t it?” he asked, though she hoped that more explanation was coming since she wasn’t sure what he was implying yet. “Thinking machines. <em>Thinking</em>. These weren’t mere devices or tools to be used, like the ‘thopter we flew on or the hooks I’m using on the worm. In the Butlerian Jihad humans destroyed billions of physical machines that could think, and too many AI in simulated virtual worlds to ever hope to count. Many of those thinking machines were conscious being that experienced human emotions just like you and I do. That wasn’t simply a revolt; it was an act of genocide. Or so it seems to me at least.”</p><p>Irulan hummed thoughtfully. She had never thought of the Great Revolt in those terms, but he did have a point. Perhaps those machines her ancestors had destroyed felt the same sort of fear that the Atreides men had felt when the combined forces of Baron Harkonnen and her father’s Sardaukar killed them, or the victims of Paul’s ongoing jihad felt now. It was a strange and uncomfortable thought.</p><p>“Just last night I saw a memory of one of those virtual AI worlds, the ones that historians don’t even bother to mention most of the time when they write about the Butlerian Jihad,” Paul went on. “A young man and a woman, teenagers both, ran into a lost little girl in the woods. But she wasn’t a little girl, not on the inside. She was actually a thinking machine. What do you think they did with her, Irulan?”</p><p>“I don’t know,” Irulan said honestly. Being repulsed by thinking machines had been so ingrained in humanity for so long that her immediate reaction was to think they had killed the child machine, but that didn’t seem like a probable conclusion. She doubted Paul would be telling her this story if that was how it ended.</p><p>“They adopted her,” he said. “They adopted the thinking machine without a second thought, but that’s not even the most interesting part of the story. Yui, that’s the little girl’s name, she genuinely regarded them as her parents and looked to them to protect her.”</p><p>“That’s interesting,” Irulan said. It <em>was </em>interesting, but she didn’t know what she was supposed to make of it.</p><p>“I don’t doubt that humanity’s future would have been bleak if the other side had won the Butlerian Jihad,” Paul said. “But I’ve explored so many alternative futures, and I have to question whether this reality we’re living in now is really any better than what would have happened if the war had gone the other way.”</p><p>“Do you honestly wonder that?” Irulan said, surprised. She’d taken a cautious and noncommittal stance when recalling the revolt, but hearing Paul with all his knowledge and memories state that he didn’t know if it had truly been the best path was not something she would have ever expected.</p><p>“Look at our present, Irulan,” he said. “Humanity lives in a feudalistic society, having lost so much knowledge and regressed so far. The entire human race is carefully manipulated by your masters the Bene Gesserit, the Spacing Guild, the squabbling nobles of the Landsraad, and all the other factions in the Imperium clawing for their own hold. Perhaps it would have been better if the thinking machines had taken control and had their day to advance civilization. We’ve only gone backwards, and we’re still on a gradual path to extinction nevertheless.”</p><p>“Extinction?” Irulan whispered. If she’d been surprised before, she was shocked beyond belief by now. Hearing anyone say that humanity was facing extinction would have gotten at least some response out of her, but for Paul of all people, with his memories and his powers, to make that claim? It left her shaken. “You can’t mean it.”</p><p>“Can’t I?” Paul said, and he sounded darkly amused. “I do not exaggerate, Irulan. Humanity is on the path to extinction.” He laughed slightly. “Congratulations on being the first person I’ve ever shared that with. I’ve never even told Chani.”</p><p>Irulan didn’t know what to say to that; to any of it. What could she even say? Paul didn’t seem in the mood to continue the conversation either, so for the next little while it was only the sound of the worm moving through the desert (at Paul’s direction) that disturbed the otherwise silent sounds of the day on Arrakis.</p><p>--</p><p>After traveling on the worm in near total silence for several minutes, they came across a rock projection. “We’ll be getting off here,” Paul said.</p><p>They got off of the worm, which went on its way, sulking. Paul led her down several unremarkable passageways until they eventually came to a cave chamber. Irulan examined it curiously as they stepped inside. It looked like it had been abandoned and not used in quite some time; the few skeletons scattered around spoke to that. But the tools she saw gave her a pretty good idea of what it had been used for back before it had been abandoned.</p><p>“This must have been an Imperial Ecological Testing Station,” she said. Paul nodded, not looking at her.</p><p>“It is, yes,” he said. “Or it was at least. But it’s also far more than that.” He led her down another passage, and as he walked he shared this place’s true significance with her. “This is the place where Duncan Idaho died.”</p><p>Paul led her into what had been an office. “This was where I met with Chani’s father, the planetologist Liet Kynes, before the Harkonnens captured him. My mother and I had only just escaped from the Harkonnens, but they caught up to us here. This was when we were at our weakest. If they’d made it all the way to us here, we would’ve both been dead, the Atreides line would have ended and Vladimir Harkonnen and your father would have gotten what they wanted.”</p><p>Irulan didn’t bother trying to defend her father. He hadn’t relished the political necessity of making a move to wipe out the Atreides. She knew how much her father admired Paul’s father Duke Leto, and she’d seen how he’d raged when he learned of the brutal manner of the man’s death. But that her father had not taken any joy out of his attempt to remove Duke Leto as a threat to his rule was not going to mean anything to Paul, nor should it.</p><p>“But they didn’t,” she said instead.</p><p>“No, they didn’t,” Paul agreed, nodding. “And Duncan Idaho is the only reason why. He stood his ground and gave us time to escape. He dispatched seventeen of your father’s Sardaukar single-handedly. <em>Seventeen </em>of the strongest soldiers at your father’s disposal, all killed by one man before they finally brought him down.”</p><p>“I’m sure his sacrifice means a great deal to you,” Irulan said. Yet again she was reminded of the differences between them, the obstacles that had been in her way before she’d ever set foot on this planet.</p><p>“It was more than that,” Paul said. “<em>He </em>was more than that. He wasn’t just a soldier or a piece to be played on a board, which I’m sure is how Baron Harkonnen and your father viewed those Sardaukar he killed. He was my trainer, but more than that he was a valued friend and a trusted companion to me. When he died, my mother and I were all alone. There was no one else left from our old lives that we could rely on. We had nothing and had to fend for ourselves. We had to learn to survive in the desert on our own, and then we joined with the Fremen to take Arrakis back from the Harkonnens, and your father who supported them. And thus Paul Atreides became Muad’Dib.”</p><p>Irulan wasn’t sure what, if anything, she was supposed to say to that. But maybe she wasn’t expected to say anything at all, because Paul turned to look at her now.</p><p>“This is why our marriage was never going to work,” he said bluntly. “Not romantically, at least. Not in the sense that we could have become close companions like my mother and father were.”</p><p>“Because of the action my father took against yours?” she asked. That seemed to be the obvious conclusion, but he shook his head.</p><p>“Because you do not understand me, or how I came to be the man that I am,” he said. “You might hear the stories and jot them down for your histories, but you didn’t see how I got here. You can’t understand how Paul Atreides became first Usul and then Paul Muad’Dib. Not in the way that Chani does.”</p><p>Irulan wasn’t sure that she agreed with him on that point, but she kept her silence. It was obvious that he wasn’t telling her any of this so they could have a debate over it. He merely wanted her to hear it and accept it, and whether she agreed with it or not, she accepted that it was the way he felt.</p><p>“Take off your stillsuit,” Paul said. Irulan was surprised at first, but then she almost laughed. In a way it was comforting to return to familiar territory. She wasn’t used to these sorts of discussions like they’d just had, but she was very accustomed to having him use her body.</p><p>Taking the stillsuit off was considerably easier for her than putting it on had been, but Paul already had his all the way off and was waiting for her to finish. As soon as she’d removed the stillsuit completely he pulled her into his arms and kissed her. This was not a romantic kiss, but maybe that shouldn’t be a surprise after he’d just gotten through telling her why he believed their marriage had never and would never work from a romantic perspective. He claimed her mouth roughly, pressing his lips against hers and sliding his tongue along her lips until she parted them and allowed him in.</p><p>His hands claimed her as surely as his lips did. He started at her chest, grabbing onto her big breasts and squeezing them firmly. His thumbs brushed her nipples and she shivered, surprised at how good it felt. It felt good enough that she moaned into his mouth automatically, and she could honestly admit to being a bit disappointed when his hands left her chest.</p><p>They didn’t stay off of her body though. He’d left her chest only so he could reach around to the other side of her body, run his hands down her back and grab onto her ass. Her rear was not as sensitive as her chest, but he was doing this for himself rather than for her. His fingers dug into the flesh of her full ass and he squeezed, but then he lifted her up off of her feet and held her ass for support rather than for pleasure.</p><p>Paul put her down on top of the desk in the office, but he did not line up between her legs and shove his cock inside of her as she’d been expecting him to do. Instead he wound up getting down on his knees between her legs, and she watched with more than a little bit of surprise as he brought his mouth to her.</p><p>This was not the first time he’d licked her, of course. He had done so on that first night that he’d claimed her, and loath though she was to admit it, he had been excellent at it. But oral attention from him had been very sparse since that first night, and in fact she couldn’t remember him ever having done it a second time. Her impression was that he had wanted to make her feel good that first night just to prove to her that he had the ability to do so and not allow her to deny his talent, and after proving his point and establishing their new dynamics he had been concerned only with his own pleasure. She hadn’t expected to feel that tongue return to her pussy when he picked her up and put her on the table.</p><p>It was a very welcome surprise though. Irulan had become somewhat more accepting of or at least resigned to her new role that required her to be readily available for Paul to fuck and make use of whenever he wanted, but him doing something that was all about her was not a circumstance she would ever complain about. She closed her legs together so she was almost trapping his head and holding him in place, as if she was worried this unexpected attention could be taken away from her at any moment. And it very well could be. She wouldn’t put it past Paul to tease her with a hint of this only to pull back and find some new way to frustrate and humiliate her.</p><p>But he didn’t do that though. He didn’t stop, he didn’t tease, and he made no effort to pull away from her. Paul was focused on getting her off, and he soon proved to her that his memorable first performance with his head between her legs had not been a fluke. He licked and fingered her as ably as he had the first time around, and this time she wasn’t even bothering to try and deny the pleasure that he was making her feel. He remembered all of her spots, he remembered just what she liked and what had gotten her to spasm helplessly against his face the first time. His fingers pushed inside of her and curled to stroke that same sweet spot he’d touched so well before and his clever tongue swept across her clit just as expertly as it had the first time around. This time he didn’t even need to experiment and try different things before he figured out what worked best for her in particular; he just attacked all of her weak spots and gave her exactly what she needed.</p><p>Irulan had been reluctant to express her pleasure the first time her husband had eaten her out, but there were no such reservations this time. Her ass writhed on the desk, her hips squirmed and humped against his face in an effort to bring him closer, and she moaned in open pleasure as her husband adeptly played her body.</p><p>“Oh! Oh! <em>Oh</em>!” Irulan closed her eyes and spasmed as she was pushed over the edge. She squirted against Paul’s face just as she had the first time, and her hand unconsciously grabbed onto and pulled on his dark hair. When she recalled it later she was surprised that he let her get away with it, but on second thought, was it really that big a deal to have her pulling his hair when he was already letting her hump her hips into his face and shoot the proof of her orgasm all over him?  </p><p>Irulan was still in the middle of settling down from the pleasure he'd just given her when she felt the head of Paul's cock pressing against her entrance. It had become a familiar feeling for Irulan, but she wasn't sure she'd ever welcomed it quite as readily as she did now. There usually remained at least a trace of reluctance or humiliation within her that prevented her from fully enjoying the admittedly pleasurable physical sensations that usually came with her husband sticking his cock inside of her and fucking her. But at that particular moment she accepted it easily, whether because of the strange setting he'd brought her to and the unexpected conversations they'd had, or because of the ecstasy he'd already brought her with his mouth.</p><p>Maybe Irulan would reflect on this later and be confused as to how she had been able to look beyond anything and everything else surrounding her relationship with Paul and focus only on the feeling of him pushing his cock deep inside of her and pulling it back, but in the heat of the moment she wasn't concerned about anything but how good it felt to have him fucking her on top of the desk in this abandoned research station.</p><p>There was something different about it this time though, and not just because of her own lack of concern. There was also a difference in Paul's entire demeanor as he moved inside of her. While he had forced her to reluctantly feel good several times already over the course of their physical relationship, she'd always felt it had still been selfish on his part. Her pleasure was usually either something he wrenched out of her while having his own fun and humiliating her in some way, or it was something he knowingly and deliberately brought her so he could hold it over her head and feel superior. She'd seen him smirking knowingly down at her when his rough fucking forced an unwilling moan from her throat, and knew it had been just another way for him to rub her face in the control he held over her.</p><p>This was different though. There were no degrading words from him, no positions or setting that were obviously designed to embarrass her, and she saw no sign of him looking smug as he took her. He moved inside of her intently, and while he still fucked her hard, it felt different than it ever had before. He leaned over her and kissed her while he thrust his hips, and she returned the kiss without even thinking about it. Then he moved his head to the side, kissing his way across her cheek until he reached her neck. He licked and sucked on the side of her neck, and Irulan moaned and ran her hands through his hair.</p><p>As for his own hands, they moved around quite a bit over the course of screwing her on top of the desk. At first he simply held her by the hips as he got going, but soon his hands ran up her stomach and latched on to her breasts. While he did give them a firm squeeze, he seemed more interested in stimulation than in force this time. His hands grabbed at her flesh and his fingers brushed against her nipples with a sensitive, careful pressure that made her shiver and caused goosebumps to form on her skin. He'd been able to make her feel things any time his hands went to her breasts, but it had never felt like this. Rather than claiming them and playing with them for his own amusement, it felt more like he was manipulating them with the express purpose of making her feel good this time.</p><p>She groaned in disappointment when he pulled his hands away from her breasts, but he had plenty more good things in store for her. His hands were replaced by his mouth, and much like before, he seemed to put more effort into her pleasure this time. He licked and sucked at her nipples, and Irulan soon was groaning for a very different reason.</p><p>His hands weren't finished with her though; not even close. They went back the way they came, dancing down her stomach, but they did not return to her hips. Instead one of them grabbed onto the edge of the desk for support, and the other softly stroked her inner thigh. That felt pretty good, but not nearly as good as what he was able to pull off with his cock.</p><p>When Paul fucked her, he was usually concerned with driving his cock deep inside of her over and over again, as fast as he could. This seemed to be what worked best for him, and most of the time it was his own pleasure that consumed his thoughts. That was her entire purpose in this, after all, and why he had come to her in the first place. Often enough this still resulted in considerable pleasure for her, whether this was a goal of his or not.</p><p>He moved differently this time. Rather than the deep in and out penetration he usually favored, he played around with a few different approaches, seemingly running an experiment of his own in the former testing station. He wound up settling on angling his body and his cock in a way that he was not penetrating her as deeply as he normally did, but instead he brushed against her at an angle that specifically hit her sweet spot and did it consistently. Rather than brute force he was using technique on her, and for Irulan it felt as amazing as anything he'd ever done to her.</p><p>Irulan decided that it was not fitting to say that Paul was fucking her, not this time. Every time he’d been inside of her before he had been fucking her. It had been about raw, dirty and carnal fulfillment of lust, with a dash of dominance thrown in as he constantly reminded her of her place and his control over her. None of that was evident here. Paul wasn’t fucking her, not really. This was the most passionate he had ever been with her. She hesitated to call it making love, because she knew that there was not love between them. He had only just gotten through with explaining to her why their differing life experiences meant that she would never be able to understand him and they would never be able to find common ground for a truly romantic relationship.</p><p>He didn’t love her, but you wouldn’t be able to tell that just by watching how he treated her in that moment on top of the desk. Paul took her not as a tormentor or as a man who was concerned only with satisfying his own selfish desires, but as a lover, as if he truly did have feelings for her. She wondered if this was how he normally was when he was with Chani, his concubine and the woman who actually did hold his heart.</p><p>She shook off any thoughts or feelings about Chani. Thinking about Paul’s true love was not going to do her any good right now. She had a feeling she would need to deal with Chani and her reaction to all of this soon enough, even if it wasn’t going to be today as she had feared when they first flew over the Shield Wall. There was no sense in dwelling on it any earlier than she had to.</p><p>Besides, Paul was giving her plenty to occupy her mind. However he might feel about her, he was moving inside of her like he legitimately cared about her pleasure and making sure she had a good time, and it was working. Well before he had anything to worry about on his own end, Irulan moaned loudly as she experienced what might have been the biggest orgasm of her life up to that point. She clung to his neck and ran her hands through his hair, massaging the top of his head as she continued to lick and suck at her breast. She gasped into his ear, surrendering to the incredible pleasure he had granted her.</p><p>Now that he had gotten her off, Paul moved a bit faster and pushed a bit deeper inside of her from that point on. He’d seen to her pleasure (twice, in fact) and now he was concentrating on his own. He abandoned her breast, put both hands on the edge of the desk and put his all into his last few big thrusts. Irulan grunted every time he drove forward deep inside of her, and he followed her example and hit orgasm after just a couple of minutes of the swift pace. He kept his cock deep inside of her as he came, and Irulan would be lying if she said she was staunchly opposed to the feeling.</p><p>He wasn’t her lover, but in the afterglow of the most passionate sex he had ever given her, Irulan could almost pretend that he was.</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan climbed onto the second worm Paul summoned without any of the fear that had threatened to consume her the first time around. She settled in behind her husband and enjoyed the unique form of travel as they moved through the desert. Irulan didn’t know when or if she would have the opportunity to ride a sandworm again after today, but she could now say she was glad to have the experience.</p><p>They hadn’t said much after their coupling. They’d cleaned themselves up, put their stillsuits back on (with Paul seeming far more calm this time around when he instructed her) and returned to their worm travel. Irulan didn’t know how to feel about Paul, but for the moment was just relieved to have had a day that was less demanding on her than most had been. The near-silence as they made their second worm ride of the day was about as companionable a silence as they’d ever had.</p><p>It was evening by the time that they arrived at Sietch Ashar. Irulan’s light mood darkened as they neared the sietch and reality set back in for her. For whatever reason Paul wanted her here for this, she was here now. She felt like every pair of eyes in the sietch was on her as they were greeted and led towards Imam, and that may not have been all that far off from the truth. The nephew of the sietch’s Naib surely would have been known by many members of that community, and Irulan had no doubt that word of her own opinion on what should be and had ultimately been done to Haatim had made its way here. Most people would probably vilify her for the decision even though it had been Gurney Halleck who actually got the rest of the council to go along with it, and Paul who had obviously been the one to give the ultimate approval of Haatim’s fate.</p><p>They were led into the dwelling where the Naib resided, and Irulan recognized the figure seated in the center of the room as Imam. He rarely left his sietch, and all you had to do was look at his leathery tanned skin to tell that this was not a man who had grown comfortable in Arrakeen and forgotten the old ways of his people before Muad’Dib became emperor. This man was a Fremen through and through.</p><p>She had seen Imam once or twice in Arrakeen when he and his people came to greet their emperor, but he had never had reason to acknowledge her during any of his visits. She could only hope that this meeting would be just as forgettable, but she knew that this was too much to hope for.</p><p>“Welcome to Sietch Ashar, Muad’Dib,” Imam said. “You do me honor in leaving the palace and making the journey to visit me here.”</p><p>There was nothing wrong with the words, or with the way they had been spoken. Imam greeted Paul with all of the courtesy that was due to him as Muad’Dib, but there was an obvious tension there. You couldn’t hear it in how he addressed his emperor, but it was there on his face whether he tried to hide it or not. He might not be in a position to openly show anger to or disrespect Paul, but he definitely was not happy with Muad’Dib for ordering the execution of his nephew.</p><p>“You do <em>me </em>honor in welcoming me,” Paul said politely. He obviously knew that the man was angry with him; it had been clear enough to Irulan, and he was better at seeing through people than she could ever hope to be. But he did not show it or react to it. “I am pleased to have this chance to discuss all that has happened with you.”</p><p>“As am I,” Imam said. Then he glanced over at Irulan and his face hardened. “I see you have brought your <em>wife </em>along, Muad’Dib.”</p><p>Irulan was used to having people derisively refer to her as Paul’s wife, even to her face. It wasn’t like it was a great secret that while she held the title of wife, Chani was the one who held his heart. Once she would have been affronted at the disrespect, but she had grown used to it. But while she was used to the mockery and the condescending looks, and even more so now that word had spread that Paul was making use of her as little more than a whore, it was the barely concealed hatred from Imam that made her feel uneasy. While he was doing his best to remain courteous and respectful with Paul despite his anger over the death of his nephew, he wasn’t bothering to try and hide how he felt about Irulan. Not for the first time she wondered what had possessed Paul to bring her here.</p><p>“Yes, she so rarely has a chance to leave Arrakeen that I thought I would give her a chance to see something outside of her own quarters,” Paul said lightly. Imam just nodded.</p><p>“I know you are very busy, so I will not waste any of your valuable time, Muad’Dib,” Imam said. “Come with me. We will go to my chambers to discuss things in private.” He looked away from them and pointed at a Fremen servant. “Take Muad’Dib’s wife into the next room. Make sure she is given drink.” Even his anger towards her would not allow him to disrespect her so openly.</p><p>Irulan and Paul went their separate ways, Paul following Imam into his private chambers while the servant led Irulan into the next room. If she was somewhere else she might have feared an assassination attempt at this point, but Irulan wasn’t worried about that here. Though Imam would not mourn her death, he would not anger Muad’Dib so openly. Whether Paul had feelings for her or not was immaterial. She was his wife and his guest, and if anything happened to her while she was here it would put the entire sietch at risk.</p><p>She was led into the small room and took a seat in a chair that was not nearly as comfortable as any she might find in Arrakeen, but she wasn’t going to complain. She would remain the perfectly courteous guest at all times and give these people no further reason to dislike her. They had enough to go on already. Besides, she doubted it was meant as a deliberate slight. Fremen of the desert did not generally live in the same sort of comfort that residents of Arrakeen enjoyed.</p><p>A cup of spice coffee was placed into her hands a few moments after she sat down, and Irulan sipped at it slowly. She was still drinking the refreshment when a young and pretty Fremen woman entered. This was not a servant; that much was clear.</p><p>“Hello, Princess Irulan,” the young woman said, smiling at her pleasantly. She didn’t <em>seem </em>to be angry or hold a grudge towards her, but Irulan wasn’t going to let her guard down so easily. Appearances could be deceiving, as she well knew. “Welcome to Sietch Ashar.”</p><p>“Hello, and thank you,” she said cautiously. “May I have the pleasure of knowing your name?”</p><p>“I am Ayda,” the Fremen girl said. “Imam is my father.”</p><p>Irulan tensed in her seat, and wondered if she might need to defend herself after all. She doubted that Imam would be incautious enough to act against her no matter what his feelings, but perhaps his young daughter would not have the same sort of practicality. She was exceptionally good at concealing her emotions if she truly intended her harm, but Irulan would take nothing for granted.</p><p>“I see,” Irulan said, nodding her head and waiting to see what the other woman would do next. Ayda sensed her tension and laughed in a carefree manner that seemed odd and ill-fitting given the circumstances.</p><p>“There is no need for you to worry,” Ayda said. “You have nothing to fear from me, I promise. I actually am thankful to you.”</p><p>That had been perhaps the last thing Irulan would have ever expected her or anyone else in this sietch to say. The best she had really hoped for was for people to be understanding of her position, but to hear that Imam’s own daughter not only didn’t hold a grudge for the execution of her kin but was <em>thankful </em>for it?</p><p>“I’m afraid I don’t understand why you would have any wish to thank me,” Irulan said. She didn’t bring up her stance or even mention Haatim’s name, but they both knew what this was about.</p><p>“I was to marry Haatim and become one of his wives,” Ayda said, which didn’t really do anything to clear up Irulan’s confusion. “I always thought Haatim was a brutish man, as he proved with his actions on Seprek proved. I had no desire to be his wife, so however my father might feel about what happened to Haatim, you have my gratitude.”</p><p>“I am glad you are pleased with your circumstances, but in truth Gurney Halleck was more responsible for Haatim’s punishment than I was,” Irulan said truthfully. She found it ironic that so many people seemed to blame her for the decision, and here she was trying to diminish her own involvement in it when met with someone who was actually pleased with what had happened to Haatim.</p><p>“Yes, that’s what I heard,” Ayda said. “You still shouldn’t be so modest about it though. Gurney Halleck might have been the one who got people to listen, but I’m still grateful to you for being the first person to speak up and see that proper justice was done.”</p><p>There was something not quite right here. Irulan couldn’t put her finger on what it was, but something told her that there was something off about Ayda. Despite that, she found herself warming up to the Fremen woman.</p><p>“Thank you,” Irulan said. “I was just attempting to see to it proper punishment was given.”</p><p>“And I’m glad you did,” Ayda said, smiling at her. “Not everyone might feel that way, but it’s important that no one be allowed to get away with doing whatever they want to do. No one should be above punishment.”</p><p>“I agree completely,” Irulan said, and she returned the Fremen’s smile with one of her own. “I’m glad that even someone with blood ties to Haatim could see my side of things. It reassures me.”</p><p>“And it reassures me that Muad’Dib has one such as you by his side,” Ayda said. “I was so happy when I was told you would be accompanying him today. We all expected that Muad’Dib would come to speak with my father eventually, but having you here with us as well was an unexpected gift.”</p><p>“Thank you for saying that,” Irulan said, smiling genuinely. “If only there were more who felt that way about my presence in Arrakeen.” Or anyone, really. Irulan was incredibly isolated in the palace, surrounded by people who did not like her, trust her or respect her.</p><p>“Maybe I could help change that,” Ayda said. “Staying in the sietch has become almost unbearable for me since Haatim’s death. Maybe I could come back to the palace with you as a companion?”</p><p>Of all of the things that Irulan expected to come her way here, a sympathetic face who offered to come back with her and offer her companionship in the palace was not something that had ever entered her mind. That the young woman was Imam’s own daughter was even more improbable.</p><p>“I’d like that,” she said honestly. It might be unexpected, and she didn’t know how Paul or Imam would feel about it, but Irulan could use all the friendly faces she could find.</p><p>--</p><p>It had already been evening by the time they made it to the sietch, and Paul’s meeting with Imam was not a simple matter that was over with quickly. Irulan passed a pleasant evening with Ayda before the Fremen woman excused herself to go about her nightly routine, and then another drink was brought to her. She drank alone while she waited for Paul to return.</p><p>Her second cup of spice coffee was already empty by the time Paul was led into her room by the same Fremen servant who had brought her in initially. Imam was not with him, which Irulan wasn’t sure was a good sign or a bad sign. Paul didn’t look visibly displeased, but she also couldn’t see any sign of him being happy either. He was frustratingly closed off.</p><p>“It’s obviously too late for us to return to Arrakeen tonight, so we’ll be staying here for the night,” Paul announced when he saw her. She nodded; it was what she’d expected, and the only thing that made sense. She wasn’t exactly thrilled about closing her eyes while in a sietch comprised largely of people who did not trust her and some who directly blamed her for the death of the Naib’s nephew, but it wasn’t like there was any other option. “Imam has graciously given us use of one of his rooms. If you’re hungry, we can eat there.”</p><p>“That sounds wonderful,” she said. She hadn’t even realized how hungry she actually was until he mentioned it, but now that she was made aware of it she could badly go for some food. She’d had an eventful day, experiencing everything from braving her first sandworm ride, Paul declaring that humanity was on the path to extinction, enduring the stares of the Fremen of the sietch and the open dislike of Imam and making a surprising acquaintance in the man’s daughter. Oh, and there was also Paul giving her the most passionate sex of her life.</p><p>They were guided to the chambers Imam had prepared for them, and food was brought in quickly. Irulan ate her portion with relish. It was standard fare, laden with spice as most everything was in the diet of a true desert Fremen, but Irulan had worked up such an appetite that it tasted unusually good.</p><p>“Are you going to tell me how your meeting with Imam went?” she asked in between bites. She might be curious to know what had happened, not to mention incredibly hungry, but that didn’t mean she would forget her manners.</p><p>“Perhaps I will, and perhaps I won’t,” Paul said, giving her a smile that irritated her. “It went as I anticipated it would. I will say that much for now.”</p><p>Irulan shook her head and returned to her food. He obviously wasn’t going to give her any more than that, so she let the matter drop.</p><p>She was finished well before Paul, and watched as he pushed his chair back and stood up from the table. “Come,” he said, extending his hand to her. She took it, allowing him to pull her to her feet. He did not guide her to the sole bed that occupied the room. Instead he pushed her robes up her body and palmed her breasts while kissing her neck. He freed his cock so quickly that she didn’t even notice until it was already out and pressing hot and hard against her thigh.</p><p>He picked her up by her ass and held her off of the ground as he moved his hips forward and pushed his cock inside of her. She knew Paul was a strong man, and he reminded her of that again here by holding her up and in place as he fucked her. And fuck her he did. Even if he didn’t actually love her, making love seemed to be the most fitting way to describe what he’d done with her back at the testing station, but now he was back to something far more familiar. He drove his cock into her hard enough to make her breasts bounce every time his hips slapped against her. </p><p>While she had reveled in the unexpected passion he’d shown her earlier that day, there was something to be said for this as well. The passionate sex of before and the particular emphasis he had placed on making her happy, whether with his mouth or his cock, had been different than his usual use of her, and she had enjoyed the unfamiliar feeling of being treated more like a lover than a woman who he used to sate his lust since the Fremen girl who truly held his heart was gone. Having her husband put her pleasure ahead of his own for even an hour or two was not something Irulan was used to, and she had been happy to enjoy it while it lasted even if she’d known it would only be a temporary situation. He loved Chani, not her, and sooner or later the passion and the selflessness would disappear.</p><p>She was back on familiar ground now, being held up by Paul’s strong arms as he fucked her hard. This was the sort of thing she had become used to when Paul called on her. It was lust rather than passion or emotion that drove Paul on now, but being used to satisfy his lust has its perks too.</p><p>Eventually he seemed to tire of this particular position, but he did not put her down. Instead he carried her across the room and pinned her against the wall behind her. She wasn’t sure why he didn’t simply take her over to the bed and fuck her there, but maybe he was simply tired of having sex with her in beds by this point. Not that it really mattered; her body was his to use as he wanted, whenever, however and wherever he wanted it. If he wanted to pin her to the wall and fuck her in Sietch Ashar, that’s what he was going to do.</p><p>Much as she had done earlier that day, Irulan gave herself up to the pleasure. It was happening either way, so she might as well sit back and enjoy it. And if the other Fremen in the sietch heard them, well, what did it matter? Chani might have his heart, but she was still his wife; it wasn’t like there was anything Imam or anyone else could say in complaint about this. She wasn’t sure how close by Imam’s personal quarters were, but Irulan was secretly amused by the thought of the old Fremen Naib having to listen to her getting fucked and enjoying it. She leaned her head back against the wall, squeezed him with her legs and closed her eyes.</p><p>No sooner had she closed her eyes than she snapped them right back open. She’d seen something flash in her peripheral vision just as she’d been closing her eyes, and her Bene Gesserit training allowed her to both recognize what it was and the danger that it posed. Any thoughts about sexual gratification were eliminated in an instant. This was serious; this was a life and death situation.</p><p>She gasped and tried to get a warning out, but Paul had seen it too. He’d received ample training as an Atreides, and he knew what he had seen as surely as Irulan did. He stopped thrusting into her, put her back on her feet, pulled his cock out of her and spun around all in one fluid motion. As she had learned when doing her research on him for her histories, he already had experience dealing with this particular danger when he was younger.</p><p>He launched into action, crushing the tiny flying machine before it could reach either of them and inject its target with its needle that was tipped with a quick and deadly poison. Irulan legitimately could not begin to guess at who the intended target had been. Paul was obviously the bigger target; he was the emperor. He was respected and revered by most here on Arrakis, and feared across the universe, but he had no shortage of enemies as well. Plenty of people across the galaxy would celebrate if Emperor Paul Atreides was slain. There were probably even a few on Arrakis as well. Maybe this could even be Imam’s doing. She’d thought he would not put the entire sietch at risk by attacking either of them, but maybe she had underestimated his thirst for vengeance. </p><p>Irulan didn’t rule herself out as a candidate either. She didn’t have nearly as many enemies as Paul, but she didn’t have many friends to speak of either. Perhaps someone, either Imam or someone else, had decided to try and claim vengeance for Haatim through her because they believed the emperor to be untouchable.</p><p>“A hunter-seeker,” Paul said sharply, straightening his clothes out and glancing around for a suitable weapon. “I don’t need to tell you what that means.”</p><p>“No,” Irulan agreed, straightening her own robes out. That it meant someone wanted one or both of them dead was obvious, but there were more pressing concerns than that. A hunter-seeker didn’t do a thing on its own. There was always someone remotely operating it, and that someone was close by. They had seen that the hunter-seeker had failed, but that didn’t mean the attempt on their lives was finished.</p><p>Irulan did not wait to see what Paul would do by way of defense. After surveying the room for something she might fashion into a weapon, she picked up the knife she had been using to eat her food off of the table. It wasn’t the perfect weapon, but it would have to do under the circumstances. She had never become a master of the prana-bindu arts taught by the Bene Gesserit, but she’d advanced far enough in her training that she would not be an easy kill for anyone who attempted to do so.</p><p>A group of Fremen rushed into the room, and they quickly revealed themselves to be unfriendly by going straight on the attack. Most of them seemed to head in Paul’s direction, but Irulan had attackers of her own to deal with.</p><p>She was very nearly distracted into making a fatal mistake when she recognized the leader of the group as Imam’s daughter Ayda. Ayda laughed when she saw Irulan’s surprise, and Irulan only just avoided a slash from one of her attackers.</p><p>“Surprised to see me again so soon, Irulan?” the Fremen woman asked, and there was none of the casual warmness in her voice that had been there earlier that evening. “The real Ayda was surprised to see me as well, before I killed her and took her face.”</p><p>Irulan cursed herself for not recognizing the pretender for what they were earlier. Adept Bene Gesserit could detect a face dancer’s presence by a distinct odor that their pheromones released, an odor that revealed them as something not human. Irulan had been able to sense that there was <em>something </em>off about her, but had not advanced far enough in her abilities to recognize precisely what that was. If she had she would have been able to hatch a plan with Paul and possibly Imam as well, and they could have caught the creature by surprise. But she had not recognized what her feeling was, and had even been sucked in by the face dancer’s friendly performance.</p><p>“We were expecting Muad’Dib to visit this sietch after Haatim’s execution,” the face dancer who had killed Ayda and taken her place said, “but that he would bring his estranged wife along with him was a surprise even to us. We’ll be happy to kill you both though.”</p><p>Irulan ignored the creature’s taunt and focused on the attacker nearest her. She used her Bene Gesserit training to keep herself calm in the face of danger, and she quickly proved that she was no easy target. If this face dancer had been expecting to kill her easily before moving on to help the others deal with Paul, Irulan quickly disabused them of that notion. It wasn’t a realization that would ever get much of a chance to sink in though, because Irulan slashed them with her knife, using her prana-bindu training to turn the ordinary utensil into a weapon of destruction.</p><p>The lead face dancer, the one who had worn the face of Imam’s daughter and spoken to her with such friendliness and understanding what had been only hours ago, was no longer smiling. This attack was not going as planned. Irulan allowed a bitter, mocking smile to come to her face, and then she ran straight at the face dancer rather than wait for them to come to her.</p><p>The face dancer had deceived her earlier in the evening, but now it was Irulan’s turn to do the deceiving. She feinted as if she was going to try and fight the face dancer with her fists, but instead she swept its leg out from under it with a swift kick. The pretender fell onto its back, and that was all the opening Irulan needed. The face dancers might be trained assassins, but they died just as easily when you combined a sharp knife with a Bene Gesserit’s deadly training on how to use it. She might not have advanced her skills far enough to recognize why she had an odd feeling when conversing with the face dancer, but in this at least her training had proven to be effective.</p><p>The face dancer who had pretended to be Imam’s daughter did not go out with a whimper, however. They knew their fate had been sealed and they would be dead within seconds, but they made the most of that time. Irulan felt a sharp, sudden pain in her right side. She had been stabbed by the face dancer in its final act of defiance before it breathed its final shuddering breath and went still forever. Apparently Irulan had been so focused on dealing with this particular face dancer who had dared mock her to her face that she’d gotten too caught up in it and had allowed the dying assassin to deal her a potentially fatal blow. How careless. The Reverend Mother would be so disappointed in her when she learned of her failure.</p><p>Irulan tried to use her Bene Gesserit training to calm her breathing and focus on a clinical assessment of her physical state, but this was a losing battle. She couldn’t get a sense of how deep the cut was or whether or not it posed an imminent threat to her life, but she could feel her consciousness fading, so it was at least moderately serious.</p><p>The last thing Irulan saw before her eyes closed was Paul rushing towards her.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. The Return</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Muad’Dib and his council weigh how to respond to the assassination attempt. Later, Paul and Irulan get reacquainted to the exclusion of all else.</p>
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    <p>
  <em>"You are a grave disappointment, daughter," Emperor Shaddam Corrino said, looking at Irulan and shaking his head. His eyes were cold, as they so often were, but somehow they seemed even worse now as they looked upon her with disdain and disapproval. "You have failed me. You were meant to preserve the Corrino Empire after that boy stole my throne. You were meant to keep our hold on the throne through your heirs, but you failed. The son of Leto uses you, my daughter, the daughter of an emperor, as if she were a common whore! You have failed your family!</em>
</p><p><em>No! </em>Irulan sat up and tried to plead with her father, to reason with him and make him see that she'd done all that she could, but when she opened her eyes it was her husband's face looking down at her rather than that of her father. She tried to say something to him, but her eyes drifted closed again before she could do so and she returned to an uneasy sleep.</p><p>
  <em>"Some Bene Gesserit you turned out to be!" Reverend Mother Gaius Mohiam's lips curled in a sneer as she regarded her failed protégé. "We spent over ten thousand years carefully managing our breeding program to bring us the Kwisatz Haderach before Lady Jessica allowed sentiment to get in the way. You were our chance at redemption. If you had succeeded in breeding with Paul Atreides, we could have saved it all. But you became nothing but a whore for him to use while he put all of his attention on his true love, a mere Fremen girl. You were bred and trained for this, but you allowed some common Fremen girl to stand in your way. All those generations of Bene Gesserit who worked towards the path that would lead us to the Kwisatz Haderach, and you ruined it all. You are the biggest disgrace in the history of our ancient order!"</em>
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  <em>Irulan shook her head vehemently. She'd done all that she could! Why couldn't anyone see that! She could have had a better life with Paul if her father and the old Baron Harkonnen hadn't killed Paul's father Duke Leto and so many of the Atreides loyalists, only to lose him and the Lady Jessica. After her father made an enemy of him and drove him into hiding, and into the arms of Chani, how was she meant to compete? How was she meant to earn his affection or even his cooperation if his heart was already spoken for and her father and given him every reason he could ever need to hate her?</em>
</p><p>"It wasn't my fault!" she tried to say, but her throat was dry and all that came out as a weak croak. She also wasn't being interrogated by the Reverend Mother, but was instead on her back in a bed. A servant was on hand immediately to hand her water and help her drink it, and after gulping it down and soothing her dry throat, she felt a bit of her strength return.</p><p>"What's going on?" she asked. Her voice was weak, but she'd at least been able to form words.</p><p>"Muad'Dib will explain," was all the servant would say. Irulan tried to get her to speak a few more times, but could get nothing more out of her than that. Food was put in front of her and the rumbling in Irulan's stomach as she smelled the food made her realize how hungry she actually was. She wasn't thrilled about it, but she decided to deal with her hunger while she waited for Paul to arrive.</p><p>She devoured the bread she'd been given and was in the middle of her pundi rice imported from her husband's old home planet when the door opened and Paul entered. He looked relieved to see her sitting up and eating.</p><p>"I was told you were up," he said, nodding at her.</p><p>"What happened?" she asked after swallowing her mouthful of rice. "The last thing I remember is fighting the face dancers. I got stabbed in the side, and then you were rushing towards me." And then, blackness. She had a vague memory of seeing her father, though that was surely a dream, and a clearer memory of Reverend Mother Mohiam expressing her disapproval in her dreams just before she woke back up. "I'm assuming we made it out okay, if I'm here and you're standing there looking like you don't have a scratch on you."</p><p>"None of them so much as nicked me," he said. "You were not so fortunate. You've been unconscious for two days now." She nodded; that explained her thirst and hunger, as well as her general fatigue.</p><p>"How bad were my injuries?" she asked. She assumed they weren't life-threatening, otherwise she doubted she would have woken up or lasted for two days after the attack.</p><p>"You received some damage to your liver," Paul informed her. Irulan frowned, imagining the scarring that would likely result from such a stab wound. "We were able to get you into surgery right away with a very good Suk doctor, so there won't be any permanent damage and your skin won't scar. The doctor says you should be fit enough to leave your bed tomorrow, most likely."</p><p>Irulan exhaled. She was still angry with herself for allowing the face dancer who'd taken Ayda's face to deal her a blow just before their dying breath, but she'd survived it and would apparently bear no permanent reminder of her failure. She wouldn't have a scar or face any other health complications, anyway. The memory would not likely be as quick to fade from her mind, however.</p><p>"So what was the story behind the attack?" she asked. With her health settled, this became the central issue. "I might have believed Imam could be responsible; he has reason to hate you for executing his nephew, and me as well for suggesting it. But that face dancer who stabbed me took the face of his daughter. That rules him out."</p><p>"Yes." Paul nodded. "It seems that after Haatim's execution, the Tleilax appeared to decide that it would make for a good opportunity to attempt to assassinate me and frame Imam for the deed. They anticipated that I would visit Sietch Ashar in person to meet with Imam, and they moved quickly to prepare their trap. They replaced several Fremen in Sietch Ashar with their face dancers, and Imam's daughter Ayda was one of those who was killed and replaced. There they waited for me to arrive, and since you came too, they attempted to kill you as well."</p><p>"I see," Irulan said. How ironic that an attempt had been made on her life merely out of convenience. But that wasn't the only piece of irony here. "I suppose this means you don't need to worry about getting Imam back on your side again after what happened to Haatim." Paul had gone to Sietch Ashar in order to try and repair his relationship with Imam, and in killing his daughter to try and get to Paul, the face dancers happened to do his work for him.</p><p>"Yes, it goes without saying that Haatim's execution for his crimes is no longer Imam's prime concern," Paul said. "He and his sons, along with a growing number of Fedaykin officers, are very much in favor of bringing the Jihad to Tleilax. There will be a council meeting tomorrow to discuss it, and if the doctor says you are able I would like for you to attend. I think your presence is important."</p><p>"As a victim of the attack, or as your wife?" she asked.</p><p>"As both," he said. "And also as one of my councilors." She nodded slowly.</p><p>"I'll be there," she promised. She didn't know what was about to happen, or how seriously her counsel would be taken by Paul or by anyone else in that room, but she would be there even if she had to drag herself out of this bed.</p><p>Something big was coming. She could feel it.</p><p>--</p><p>Maybe Paul was too busy preparing for the meeting, or maybe he was being merciful on her on account of her injuries. Whatever the cause, he did not call on her to relieve his sexual urges during the day after she woke, or in the evening. He didn't even come in to make use of her first thing in the morning, as she had gotten used to. She did not see him again until later in the morning when she walked into the council chamber and claimed the seat that had been reserved for her. She felt many sets of eyes following her, and it wasn't hard to guess as to why. This would have been the first time any of them (aside from Paul, obviously) had seen her since the attack that was at the center of this meeting. She ignored the stares and took her seat with her head held high. Whatever happened, she would not show weakness.</p><p>“I don’t think I need to tell anyone why we’re here today,” Paul said.</p><p>“My wild guess is that it has something to do with the assassination attempt on your life that resulted in your wife being stabbed,” Alia said dryly.</p><p>“Indeed,” Paul said, ignoring his sister’s sarcasm. “The Tleilax council of masters has responded to our communication, and they’ve disavowed all knowledge of what happened in Sietch Ashar. They claim that they had nothing to do with the attempt on my life and that of my wife Irulan. According to them this was the action of a Tleilax master who went rogue and acted without their knowledge or approval. They also assure me that they have identified and executed this rogue master, and hope that this will resolve the matter.”</p><p>“Oh, I’m sure they claim that,” Alia said, rolling her eyes. “Did you ask them to send you a head?”</p><p>“No,” Paul said, “but it’s funny you asked. They did inform me that they have already submitted a report to the Landsraad with evidence to support their claims, and they would be happy to send an official ambassador here to Arrakis with the now deceased master’s head.” Alia smirked at her sarcastic suggestion actually being something that the Tleilax had offered, but she said nothing else. Paul looked at Irulan for the first time, and she decided to make her voice heard.</p><p>“They’re lying, of course,” she said, and she made sure to phrase it not as a question but as a simple statement of fact. The reaction was something she was not used to in these meetings: universal agreement and support. Her opinions and suggestions were almost always dismissed and she was rarely given any sort of respect by anyone in this room, but this time around there wasn’t a single member of the council who wasn’t nodding along or voicing their verbal agreement with what she’d said. She still didn’t know if their opinion of her had improved any, but on this issue at least everyone was united. Not a single one of them was fooled by the Tleilaxu’s transparent attempt at denying responsibility. They were obviously behind this.</p><p>“I agree,” Gurney Halleck said, echoing what everyone else was saying and thinking. “But whatever we might believe, it doesn’t matter if we don’t have any hard evidence to show the Landsraad that would disprove their claims. Do we have such a thing?”</p><p>“We don’t,” Paul said simply.</p><p>“And why should that matter?” Korba asked. “What do we need the approval of the Landsraad for? What’s to stop us from invading Tleilax, along with every other world controlled by the Bene Tleilax? The Landsraad hasn’t exactly given their support to most of the necessary actions we’ve taken during the Jihad, but that hasn’t stopped us.”</p><p>“Invading the worlds controlled by the Tleilaxu would be a far more difficult campaign than anything the Fedaykin have done over the past five years,” Alia said. It wasn’t often that Irulan found herself in agreement with Paul’s younger sister, but she nodded along now. It was true. Nothing that the Fremen had done during their Jihad was comparable to openly going after the Bene Tleilax.</p><p>“Alia is right,” Gurney said. “If we’re going to take any military action against the Tleilaxu, we need support from the other Great Houses of the Landsraad.”</p><p>“So what do we do?” Stilgar asked. “Do we do nothing?” Stilgar, most trusted among all of Paul’s Fremen confidants, was not happy at the idea of letting the Bene Tleilaxu’s assassination attempt go unanswered. But he wasn’t quite as brazen and vengeful about it as Korba at least.</p><p>“There can be value in silent observation,” Irulan said. “Watching, waiting, and seeing what moves others make can be more useful than acting before the time is right.” Korba didn’t bother trying to hide his disdain for that suggestion, but Paul nodded.</p><p>“That’s true,” he said. “And I strongly believe that the plot in Sietch Ashar was only one part of their schemes. I’m sure that they have more in store for us.”</p><p>“So what is our next move, Muad’Dib?” Stilgar asked.</p><p>“We accept the meeting with the Tleilax ambassador,” Paul said. “I believe that it will prove quite revealing.”</p><p>--</p><p>In the end, watching and waiting was what the council decided on. Stilgar wasn’t overly pleased about it, and Korba was openly unhappy, but everyone else was in agreement that discretion was the better part of valor for now.</p><p>Irulan was relaxing in her chambers later that day, having eaten and feeling much better than she had when she’d first come to after her stabbing. She wasn’t quite back at full strength yet, but she knew she was well on her way. She really was quite fortunate to have escaped the attack unscathed, relatively speaking, and she was determined not to let her guard down again as she had in Sietch Ashar. If she made another mistake like that she might not be so lucky next time.</p><p>She looked up when there was a knock on her door. “It’s me, Irulan,” Paul said. “Can I enter?” Why was he asking for permission? Up until now he had barged in whenever he felt like it and made use of her body however he wanted. Was this him feeling sorry for her because of her injury?”</p><p>“Come in,” she said. She watched curiously as he walked into her chambers. Before he’d always walked around her chambers as if he owned them, which in a sense was true. But everything about him was different now. His body language was different, as was the look on his face. For the first time since he’d taken her virginity, it felt like these were her chambers and he was merely a visitor.</p><p>“How are you feeling?” he asked. “Is the stab wound feeling okay?”</p><p>“It’s better,” she said truthfully. “Not perfect, but better. I’m a little bit sore, but it’s not too bad. I think I’ll be fine by tomorrow.”</p><p>“That’s good,” he said. He smiled at her, but it didn’t reach his eyes. She got the impression that there was something he wanted to say to her, but he couldn’t figure out how. She decided she needed to give him a little nudge.</p><p>“Did you need to speak to me about something, Paul?” she asked. He nodded at her, but he didn’t speak right away. She watched and waited, and after a moment he nodded again, firmer this time.</p><p>“You don’t have to wear the collar anymore,” he said, catching her by surprise. But he wasn’t done. “I will return your underwear to you as well.”</p><p>Irulan was stunned. He’d claimed her; he’d invaded her chambers, taken her virginity and used her on a daily basis, fucking her however he wanted, humiliating her for his own satisfaction. Now he was giving everything back to her, just like that? She didn’t know what had brought this on. Perhaps it was his guilt over her getting stabbed, something that was not actually his fault but had happened because she was there with him. Or maybe there were other factors at play here. It was hardly the first time the motivations and thought processes of Paul Atreides had seemed impossible for her to understand.</p><p>“Thank you,” she said, for lack of anything better to say. What was the point of trying to figure out what Paul’s motivations were? She would never be able to understand him. If he wanted to let her take her collar off or give her her underwear back, she wasn’t going to question it. She was just going to accept it.</p><p>“Do you really think you’re going to be able to learn anything from the ambassador the Bene Tleilax sends here?” she asked, changing the subject. “You know they’ll be expecting you to try something.”</p><p>“Of course they will,” he said, smiling slightly. “They’re not stupid. They know I won’t believe them, so they won’t send anyone here without being completely confident that it poses no risk to them. They might even be hoping that their representative here can carry out some kind of backup plan to take me out. But whatever they try, we’ll be ready for it. And when the time is right and we’ve gotten what we need, we’ll make our move against them.”  </p><p>It was nothing definitive, and Paul was right in saying that the Bene Tleilax would not send anyone here if they weren’t confident that it posed no risk to them. But there was something about the way Paul spoke and the confidence she felt from him that convinced her that he was right. Paul Atreides had abilities that were quite extraordinary, and the Bene Tleilax were sure to regret their failed attempt to assassinate him. Since said attempt had given her a nice stab wound in the side, Irulan hoped she was there to see their downfall.</p><p>“Would you rather I have kept ignoring you?” Paul asked, changing the subject again after maybe twenty seconds of silence between them. “Would that have been better than doing what I did? Using you as I did? Making you my sex slave?”</p><p>Irulan took a long time in answering, because she wanted to make sure she gave the question the thought it deserved before giving her answer. She thought about the humiliation of how she’d been treated by him, the pain and the disrespect he’d forced upon her. But she also thought about the emptiness and isolation that came before it.</p><p>“It was wrong for you to do what you did,” she said at last. “You forced yourself on me, ignoring my wishes and treating me not as a person but as something to be used. You humiliated me.” Paul nodded without interrupting her, seemingly accepting what she was saying without disagreement. “But I was so lonely before that. I was all alone here, with no one to talk to and no one who cared about me. When I think back to how I felt back then, I know I could never go back to those days. As wrong as what you did was, I honestly am glad that you did it. I wish it could have happened differently; I wish we could have had an actual marriage, or even a friendship, or if nothing else a simple mutual understanding and respect where we got along and had heirs together. But what we have, immoral as it is, is still better than where I was at before.”</p><p>“I wish it had been different too,” Paul admitted. “I’ve been cruel to you, both before and after I forced myself upon you. You should never have been treated the way I treated you, and you should never have been made to feel so alone that it would actually seem like an improvement.”</p><p>As surprised as Irulan had been when Paul told her she could remove her collar and go back to wearing underwear, she was even more surprised now. After the way he’d ignored her for years and then had roughly used her once Chani left, she’d never expected him to show the slightest remorse for any of the things that he’d done. Yet here he was, apologizing not only for using her for his own satisfaction after Chani’s departure, but also for ignoring her and making her feel isolated before that.</p><p>What she did next surprised both of them. It might have honestly surprised her even more than it surprised him, because she’d long since given up on ever having anything resembling a cordial relationship with Paul, and she’d spent quite some time actively hating him after he’d forced himself on her. The last thing she would have ever expected to do was put her hands on his cheeks, lean in and kiss him on the lips.</p><p>Paul gasped and flinched as he felt her lips touch his. It occurred to her that she had just taken him by surprise. With all of his prescience and everything he’d seen he apparently hadn’t seen anything that would lead him to expect a kiss initiated by her. Irulan had just caught Paul Muad’Dib by complete surprise, and the thought made her smile against his lips.</p><p>He got over his surprise quickly enough, and it wasn’t long before he started moving his lips against hers and returning her kiss. Their lips pressed against each other, and then it progressed into his tongue leaving his mouth and running across her lips. She parted her lips and opened her mouth to allow his tongue inside, and then closed in on it and gave it a suck.</p><p>Simple kissing turned into his arms wrapping around her body and pulling her flush against him. Irulan moaned into his mouth, wrapped her own arms around him and started to caress him through his clothing, but that wasn’t enough. She tugged his top up, and he raised his arms to let her pull it off more easily. Then her hands went below the waist, tugging and not stopping until she’d stripped him naked and his cock was out for her.</p><p>“You don’t have to do this,” Paul said as Irulan got down on her belly between his legs, wrapped her hand around his cock and leaned her head in. “I’m not forcing you to do anything.”</p><p>“I know you aren’t,” she said. She’d sucked her husband’s cock many, <em>many </em>times since he’d first barged into her chambers uninvited and decided to show her what it felt like to be used instead of ignored. But there was a fundamental difference between this time and all of the times that had preceded it. “This time I’m doing it because I want to.”</p><p>It was bizarre to admit, but yes, she truly did want to suck Paul’s cock. He’d wronged her, both before and after their argument that turned their relationship from one that was distant and lacked any meaningful interaction to one that was filled with humiliation and reluctant pleasure. But Irulan found herself able to move on from the bitter feelings and the humiliation she’d felt and look instead to what she had now. Did Paul love her? She didn’t think so. He was showing some decency to her and admitting that he’d mistreated her in the past, but that did not equate to the genuine love and affection she’d seen him show to Chani before she left. He didn’t love her, or at least she didn’t think he did, and she doubted that he ever would. But he desired her, that was for certain, and today he was treating her with more kindness than anyone (perhaps aside from Chani, ironically) had shown her since she came to Arrakis five years earlier. At least in this moment, that was enough for her.</p><p>She took Paul’s cock between her lips now not because he had ordered her to, but because she felt like it. There was no hand going to the back of her head and pulling on her hair to force her to take him down deep or to hold her in place so he could fuck her face. His hands did not touch her; he let her move her head however she wanted to. Irulan took her time, licking, kissing and sucking at the head of his cock and then slowly bobbing her head down his cock. She went about halfway down before pulling back and taking him out of her mouth so she could lick his shaft as well. She licked him from tip to base, getting him nice and wet for her before she went back up and took the head back between her lips.</p><p>“That feels amazing,” Paul said. Irulan smiled around his cock and went back down, moving her lips down a bit faster this time. She suckled at him, making sure he could hear her lewd slurps as she sucked him. He’d often talked about her cocksucking skills in the past, but this time around she actually wanted to hear his praise.</p><p>Irulan was dimly aware of a knocking at her door. She stopped for a second, waiting and looking up at Paul for guidance on what to do, but he just nodded at her so she kept sucking. Whoever was here was probably here to see Paul, but if he didn’t care about it, neither did she. The knocking continued, but Irulan didn’t let that stop her. She was just finishing sliding her head all the way down and taking his cock into her throat when the knocking was accompanied by a voice.</p><p>“Muad’Dib?” It was Harah, Paul’s ‘wife’ by Fremen customs but could more appropriately be called his servant. “Muad’Dib, I need to speak to you.” Irulan paused, looking up at Paul with his cock down her throat and waiting to see how he would react. If Harah had bothered to come here on her own even knowing what was likely going on, or at least having reason to suspect it since she knew how regularly he’d been making use of Irulan’s body, it was likely important.</p><p>“It can wait, Harah,” Paul said, not even looking towards the door. Whatever Harah had to say to him, he wasn’t interested in dealing with it right now.</p><p>“It’s urgent,” Harah insisted. It was starting to get tough for Irulan to keep his cock down her throat without gagging, but still she waited.</p><p>“It can wait for at least a few minutes, I’m sure,” Paul said, and there was no room for argument in his voice. Harah muttered to herself but walked away, respecting the obvious command from Paul. Irulan wasn’t sure of the wisdom of this, but it was Paul’s decision to make. He nodded at her, so she pulled her head back and got back to sucking him.</p><p>With all outside distractions removed, at least for the time being, Irulan was able to focus solely on giving Paul the best blowjob she possibly could. When she’d sucked his cock before it had generally been about getting him off as fast as she could so she could rest, but this time, much like the first time she’d ever gone down on him, she was out to show off her skill. She bobbed her head smoothly, shook it from side to side, swirled her tongue around, stroked his shaft, played with his balls and did anything else she could think of along the way. It was all designed to make him feel good, and all designed to make sure that his orgasm was as strong and intense as possible when it came.</p><p>She succeeded in this without question. Paul’s groans grew louder the closer her mouth brought him to his end, and when it came he fired an immense amount of semen into her mouth. There were no orders for her to swallow it, and no hands holding the back of her head to make sure she couldn’t move her head back and had no choice but to swallow it. In spite of nothing compelling her to do so, Irulan swallowed it all down quickly, not letting even a single drop escape.</p><p>Irulan pulled her mouth off of him slowly, and when he was out she smacked her lips, stuck her tongue out and then smiled at him. She was still smiling when Paul nearly tackled her to the bed. She was expecting him to get straight to fucking her, and she didn’t mind the idea at all. She might be sore, but she wasn’t so sore that she wanted to stop. Her body had enjoyed the feeling of him having sex with her and the pleasure that it brought her even back when her mind hadn’t wanted anything to do with him, and now that she was not only willing to have sex with him but had actually initiated it all, she couldn’t wait for him to slide that cock inside of her. When he went down her body and started to lift her dress up, she licked her lips in anticipation. There wasn’t even anything to hold him back, because while he’d let her know she could go back to wearing underthings, that offer had not existed when she got dressed this morning. As soon as he hiked her dress up around her hips, she was right there for him, ready and willing to be fucked. She was ready for his cock.</p><p>But it wasn’t his cock that she got, at least not yet. Instead Paul spread her thighs with his hands, leaned his head in and began to lick her. Instantly she was taken back to that time in the testing station, the same day that would later see them travel to Sietch Ashar and have their encounter with the face dancers. She hadn’t expected him licking her and having the kind of passionate sex he’d had with her that day to ever become a regular thing between them. She’d thought it was an aberration, and assumed it would be a long time before he licked her like that again, if he ever did it again. Yet here he was, using his mouth on her with the exact same sort of passion and devotion that he’d shown her then. Maybe it wasn’t solely her stabbing that had brought about this change in him. Could it have been in the works even before that?</p><p>Irulan didn’t know, and maybe she never would, but in the present she was happy to simply sit back and enjoy the pleasure of Paul’s mouth lapping at her pussy. He was every bit as good at it as he had been before. While the vast majority of their sexual encounters had been exclusively about him using her for his pleasure, he was actually capable of making her feel incredible when he set his mind to it and concentrated on her. That's precisely what he did now. He wasn't down there to tease her, taunt her or merely prepare her to be fucked. Paul was in it to make her feel great, and he had the knowledge, the skill and the devotion to do so.</p><p>He knew her body very well by this point. This marked the third time in her recollection that he had put his head between her legs with the intent of not teasing her or getting her worked up but actually servicing her, and he knew just what was required of him. Once she was sufficiently prepared, which did not take long at all, he slid two fingers inside of her and curled them so he brushed against the magic spot that got her off so well. He kept at that for a bit, and then he pulled off the final step that was all but guaranteed to finish her off. As soon as his tongue began to sweep across her clit, Irulan knew it wouldn't be long now.</p><p>"Yes!" she cried. "Oh yes, Paul! Yes, please, don't stop!" Much like when he'd done this for her in the testing station, she did not bother to try and hold back her cries or deny him the audible proof that what he was doing was working wonderfully. She still didn't fully understand what had changed and why he seemed so much more concerned with her pleasure now, but she wasn't going to let that bother her. She wasn't even going to hold herself back despite the high probability that Harah was still nearby and able to hear everything that was happening while she waited for her chance to tell Paul whatever it was that she deemed urgent enough to interrupt them. Paul's Fremen servant could judge her and hate her all she wanted; Irulan wasn't going to let that stop her from enjoying this attention. She ran her hands through Paul's hair and moaned as he kept at it, bringing her closer and closer to something amazing.</p><p>Paul, listening to her pleas, did not stop. He kept going, fingering her and licking her clit until he brought her the first orgasm she'd had since her stabbing. That was the longest she'd gone without since he first touched her, and the intensity of it went a long way to make up for lost time.</p><p>"<em>Yes</em>!" she shouted. She pulled at his hair and her body shook as she squirted against Paul's face. He stayed there, letting her do it and continuing to lick and finger her until her pleasure died down and she relaxed back on the bed. There was no way Harah couldn't have heard that unless she was no longer anywhere close, but Irulan didn't care. The whole palace could hear her as far as she was concerned. It wasn't like anyone didn't know what he'd been doing with her since Chani left. Let them hear how things had changed; let them hear her pleasured cries as <em>Paul</em> focused on <em>her</em>.   </p><p> </p><p>"That was incredible," she said as she stretched and rolled over onto her belly.</p><p>"You know what else is incredible?" he asked. She didn't need to ask, because as he said it his hands went to her ass and began to grope it through her dress. Then he hiked her dress back up above her hips again so he could play with her bare skin.</p><p>"Is that right?" she said. "And what are you going to do with this incredible thing in your hands, Paul?"</p><p>"There are all kinds of things I'd like to do with it," he said. He gave her a quick slap on the ass, then another quick one, and then he pulled back, wound his arm up and gave her a harder spank. He kept going, switching cheeks every so often, usually giving her quicker and less impactful spanks but every once in a while he would give her a really hard swing so she would truly feel it.</p><p>It wasn't the first time he'd spanked her; far from it. But it felt somehow different this time. This time it felt like it was a game she was in on instead of it happening for nothing but his own amusement. Rather than simply enduring it, she wiggled her hips and shook her ass at him to encourage him to keep it up. She wound up pushing up onto her hands and knees to make her large bottom stick out even more for him to spank.</p><p>This wound up encouraging him to leave the spanking behind and move on to what she had been expecting him to do all along as soon as this got physical. With Irulan on her hands and knees, Paul massaged one of her ass cheeks with his hand while the other guided his cock in position to push against the outer lips of her pussy. This was what she'd been expecting, but more than that, it was what she'd been waiting for. His mouth on her, licking her and bringing her incredible pleasure, had been a wonderful diversion for her, and she was happy that he'd done it. But she was happy to be moving on to this.</p><p>"Do it, Paul," she whispered, wiggling against him again. "Put it inside of me!"</p><p>That was all that Paul needed to hear. He pushed his hips forward, and for the first time since she'd been stabbed and spent two days mostly unconscious, her husband's cock was inside of Irulan. It was a feeling she'd experienced too many times to count since their affair began (it was ironic to think of it as an affair, given that he was her husband, but the term fit. Whatever their official relationships might be, Chani was his wife in all but name while Irulan had held nothing but an empty title, at least until recently.)</p><p>At first she'd hated the feeling, or maybe more accurately she'd hated how good it made her body feel. But she didn't feel that way any more. However this had started, whatever ups and downs (mostly downs) their relationship had been through since they first met and no matter how much he'd wronged her, as things currently stood, Irulan felt no guilt about having his cock inside of her. Maybe she should have. Maybe she should have hated him, or maybe she should have felt guilty about actually enjoying the sex even though she knew another woman held his heart. But it was becoming harder and harder to care about any of that.</p><p>Paul got to work quickly, thrusting his hips into her from behind and fucking her hard. His hips smacked against her full ass with every thrust, and her massive breasts bounced around inside of her dress. It was a familiar feeling for Irulan. He'd fucked her on her hands and knees many times, and this sort of hard, deep fuck was far more in line with their norm than the surprisingly tender lovemaking they'd shared in the testing station. But this still felt different than all of the times they'd fucked in the past.</p><p>She wasn't entirely sure what the difference was. Did it feel different to her because of all of the things that preceded it, from him apologizing for his past treatment of her, telling her she could remove her collar and return to putting on underwear and then using his mouth to make sure she felt good before he even thought about his own pleasure? Or was this more about the changes within herself, the acceptance of how he made her feel?</p><p>Irulan wasn't sure. But what she <em>was </em>sure of was that there was no reluctance whatsoever within her as Paul's hips snapped forward to repeatedly bury his large cock deep inside of her. She loved feeling him hit so deep, she loved it when he smacked against her ass. She loved the grunts he let out as he took her (and she loved that he did so without taunting her or rubbing her face in how powerless she was, as she'd previously gotten used to.) She loved it when he reached underneath her body to cup and squeeze her breasts through her dress as he fucked her.</p><p>Paul loved it too. She already knew that, of course. If he didn't love fucking her he would have gotten tired of using her long ago instead of seeking her out with increasing regularity. But now his delight in using her body didn't upset her as it once had; it made her happy. Maybe he didn't love her, but he <em>did </em>love her body. He loved getting her on her hands and knees and fucking her, and he loved playing with her breasts and making her butt jiggle from the impact of his thrusts.</p><p>"That's it, Paul! That's it, husband!" she moaned, encouraging him. It felt strange to call him husband in this context, while he was fucking her. Traditionally this was something that one would do with their husband, but their marriage had been one of political convenience. It didn't have any love in it; it had never even had any sort of physical affection until recently. She might be his wife, but this, what she was doing with him right now, had never been her place in his life.</p><p>Right now, though, saying the word 'husband' made her smile. She was his wife and he was her husband, and they were doing what husbands and wives were supposed to do. They were doing what had been expected of them all along, and in spite of the very rocky path they had taken, in spite of the years of emotional isolation and then the physical aggression, Irulan had never felt closer to Paul than she did right then.</p><p>She hadn't felt this optimistic about her life or her future in five years. She didn't know if any of this would lead to them actually having the children they had been expected to produce all along. That might be a step too far for Paul, whose heart still belonged to another as far as she knew. He had vowed that he would never have children with Irulan, and though he'd broken a similar vow not to ever touch her, that didn't mean he would necessarily break the other promise he'd made to his beloved. Irulan would welcome children of course, but she wasn't going to get her hopes up for that just yet. For now she was simply happy to be in a more amicable situation with Paul. She was happy to have him treating her with more respect, apologizing to her and restoring some of the dignity he'd taken away, and she was happy to be able to enjoy the physical pleasures of sex without having any feelings of humiliation or guilt weighing her down. For now, this was enough for Irulan.</p><p>She was swept up in what she was feeling, and so was Paul. Just as her breathing grew short and she gasped with increasing desperation as the steady back and forth of his cock continued, so too did Paul grunt and groan above her with lesser restraint as they continued. They were both connected in that shared pursuit of something incredible, and nothing else in the world mattered to either of them in that moment beyond the pleasure they could both feel building up inside of them and begging to be let loose.</p><p>Perhaps they should have held something back though. Perhaps it would have been better if at least one of them had held onto some shred of self control and awareness of the world beyond Irulan's bed and his cock moving back and forth inside of her. If at least one of them had been paying attention, they might have heard the sound of the door to Irulan's chambers turning open. But Paul and Irulan, both lost in each other as they were, remained completely unaware as the door opened and a third party entered the room.</p><p>Irulan cried out again as she was driven to her second orgasm of the day. It felt just as sensational as the first one that he'd brought her with his mouth, if not even more so. He knew how to lick her, but without question he knew how to fuck her as well. Whatever Paul was doing, her body was defenseless against it. Not so long ago she was at war with herself for that very fact, hating how easily he could make her feel pleasure as he used her. Now she embraced it. When his thrusting penis brought her pleasure, she held onto the bed sheets in her fists and cried out with a smile. Rather than leaving her in turmoil, his cock and the way it stimulated her body brought a carefree smile to Irulan's face.</p><p>Paul wasn't going through the same emotional changes, or at least Irulan doubted that he was. He'd always enjoyed himself whenever he made use of her body, and there had been no real reason for him to be reluctant about anything. But he was right there with her when it came to the pleasure now. He was enjoying this just as she was, and he followed her over the edge within seconds of her climax. He filled her up, and despite knowing that he was giving her contraceptives to make sure she could not get pregnant, that feeling of his semen rushing into her made Irulan moan just that little bit more loudly as she went through her final moments of bliss.</p><p>And that bliss was about to become something else in a hurry, and not just for her.</p><p>"I see much has happened in Arrakeen since I have been gone," a voice said from somewhere behind them. Irulan jumped. She had not heard the door open, lost as she'd been in being fucked by her husband, but there was no way for her to miss the fact that they were not alone now. The voice cut through the peaceful aftermath of sex, and Irulan felt as if ice cold water had been dumped on her body.</p><p>It wasn't just that someone was in the room with them that affected her so. The bigger problem was that she was pretty sure she recognized that voice, and it did not belong to Harah. Unless Irulan's ears were playing tricks on her, she believed that she would only need to turn her head to see the last person in the universe she wanted to see right now, with Paul Atreides having just finished fucking her in her bed.    </p><p>Irulan didn’t want to turn her head. She wanted to avoid this moment for as long as possible; preferably forever. If it had been up to her, she would close her eyes for a second and reopen them to discover that her ears had indeed deceived her and there was no one in the room with her and Paul at all. But she didn’t attempt to do this. She knew better than to delude herself into thinking that she had been mistaken. All that was left was for her to turn her head and see who was standing behind her. Deciding that delaying any longer would be pointless, the princess looked towards her door and confirmed that this was reality.</p><p>Just as she’d feared, staring back at her was Chani, the redheaded Fremen woman who was Paul’s true partner even if Irulan technically held the title of his wife. Irulan might be his wife, but it was Chani the concubine who held his heart. It was Chani’s sudden departure from Arrakeen that had led to Paul taking Irulan’s virginity. This entire time Irulan had merely been filling a hole vacated by this woman, and now she was back.</p><p>Irulan expected to see rage on Chani’s face. She expected Paul’s lover to glare at her with the purest hatred and loathing, yell at her and perhaps even try to physically attack her. But she didn’t see what she expected to see. Chani’s eyes were narrowed in what was undeniably annoyance, but that was still far less hostile than what Irulan would have expected from her. And unless she was mistaken, she thought she even saw a flicker of amusement on her face. It was barely there, just a brief twitch of her lips, but Irulan was convinced that this was not just in her imagination. Nothing about what she could see from Chani made any sense to her. Maybe she and Paul were truly meant for each other if they both had the ability to mystify her like this.</p><p>“Sihaya,” Paul whispered. And just like that, Irulan knew that everything had just gotten a lot more complicated. She’d heard Paul use that name for Chani before, and there was no mistaking the affection that his voice still carried when he said it now. She didn’t know how her affair with Paul would complicate things, but the one thing that was clear was that he still loved Chani, and now she was back.</p><p>But where did that leave Irulan, and where would the three of them go from here?</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Offers and Gifts</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Irulan learns how Chani's return will affect her, and Paul meets with the Tleilax ambassador.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“I can see for myself that the rumors I’d heard while in the south were true,” Chani said, looking at Irulan. “Are you happy to have finally gotten what you wanted?”</p><p>“No!” Irulan shook her head quickly. It was true that she’d spent years trying to get Paul to give her children, even after she’d given up on actually winning his affection or attention away from his Fremen concubine, but that wasn’t what had happened here. “I’m not responsible for this. I made no effort to seduce him. I made no effort to do anything at all.” Chani stared at her with an inscrutable expression, and Irulan couldn’t tell whether Paul’s longtime lover believed her or not. But ultimately it wasn’t Irulan who Chani was most interested in hearing from anyway.</p><p>“Irulan speaks truly,” Paul said, drawing Chani’s attention to him. “This was not her doing.” He explained how this had all started, and Irulan was surprised at just how honest he was in retelling the story even though it did not paint him in a very positive light. Chani listened to her lover’s story in silence, and while she did not look happy, Irulan felt relieved that she at least knew the truth now. Whatever else, at least she knew that Irulan had not swooped in and seduced Paul while she was gone.</p><p>“I am not upset that you slept with another,” Chani said, and that caught Irulan by surprise. “How others might feel about that does not matter to me. I am Fremen, and we have our own views on monogamy. What upsets me, Usul, is that you broke a promise you made to me, and in doing so you forced yourself upon Irulan who did not desire it. You are a better man than that. Or at least I believed you to be. Was I wrong?”</p><p>Paul was silent, but Chani didn’t seem to be expecting an answer to her question. She shook her head, and Irulan wondered where things stood between Paul and his Fremen lover now. That led her to wonder where it left her in her own relationship, such as it was, with her husband. Then she shook her own head; this was not the time to worry about that. Things were complicated enough at the moment.<br/><br/></p><p>“Did you return to learn for yourself whether or not the rumors were true?” Paul asked. Chani shook her head.</p><p>“I prepared to return as soon as I heard that an attempt was made on your life, and that of Irulan, at Sietch Ashar,” Chani said. “Did you really think I would not return when your life had been threatened?” Paul said nothing, and Chani smiled sadly. “I wished to see for myself that you were unharmed, of course, but I also felt you could use my council.”</p><p>“Your council will always be appreciated,” Paul said softly. Chani nodded at him, and then her eyes flicked to Irulan for a few seconds before returning her attention to him. “May we speak alone, Usul? I believe there are things we need to discuss without your wife present.”</p><p>Paul looked over at Irulan for a second before nodding at Chani, and the two of them left Irulan’s chambers together to converse in private. Irulan sat alone in her chambers, still shocked at the drastic turn things had just taken.</p><p>What was next now, for all three of them? Irulan didn’t know, and while she did not like the feeling of having her own future decided for her without her participation, it wasn’t like she was going to be given a seat at the table for this.</p><p>She would just have to wait and see what happened. Hopefully they wouldn’t keep her waiting long.</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan ignored the looks and whispers that followed her as she was escorted to Chani’s chambers. Chani had only returned the previous day and yet word had spread through the palace quickly. Everyone knew that Chani, Paul’s Fremen concubine and true lover, was back, and the populace of Arrakeen was nearly as interested in how this would impact Paul’s legal wife and woman he’d carried on with while Chani was gone as Irulan herself was. Seeing her being led to Chani’s chambers would get the tongues wagging quickly, but Irulan ignored them. She was used to the whispers by now, and they didn’t matter.</p><p>What mattered was Chani’s invitation to meet. Irulan had not slept well the previous night, tossing and turning as she pondered her fate, but hopefully she would get her answers now, one way or the other. She was very interested when the attendants led her not to the chambers Chani had shared with Paul before her departure, but to a different section of the palace. If nothing else, Chani was not currently sharing her living quarters with Paul.</p><p>The attendants knocked on the door to announce her presence, and Chani called for Irulan to enter alone. She stepped through the door and saw Chani sitting alone at a table, sipping from a cup of spice coffee. Both that and a plate of bread sat in the middle of the table.</p><p>“Welcome, Irulan,” Chani said. “Thank you for coming.”</p><p>“Thank you for inviting me,” Irulan said formally. She wasn’t sure what tone this meeting was soon to take, but she would show the proper manners. If there was any chance at something approaching a cordial arrangement, she wouldn’t ruin it by getting overly defensive before she even knew what Chani’s intentions were.</p><p>“Take a seat,” Chani said. Her pretty red hair bobbed as she nodded at the chair directly across from her which was already pulled out. Irulan sat down and pulled the chair closer to the table gracefully. “Please help yourself to coffee and bread.”</p><p>“With pleasure.” Irulan wasn’t overly hungry or thirsty, but it would be poor manners to refuse. She filled the empty cup halfway and put a slice of bread on a plate, pulling both towards her.</p><p>“You must be wondering what Paul and I discussed last night, what the situation currently is, and how it will affect you,” Chani said while Irulan took her first tiny sip of coffee. Irulan would have been surprised at how blunt and to the point she was if she’d been new to Arrakis, but she’d been here long enough by now to expect such straightforwardness from Chani. Frankly it was appreciated, at least under the current circumstances.</p><p>“I will not pry, but yes, I am curious,” she said after swallowing the coffee in her mouth.</p><p>“I am not pleased with some of the things Usul did while I was in the Palmaries,” Chani said, frowning and marring her pretty elfin face (though there was a certain degree of attractiveness in her anger, Irulan supposed.) “He broke a promise, which is something the Fremen place much greater value on than the concept of monogamy. And he also treated you poorly, to say the least. He should never have forced himself upon you as he did.”</p><p>Irulan just nodded, not trusting herself to speak. Chani was correct, but Irulan couldn’t find it in herself to speak out against Paul right now. What he’d done to her at the beginning of all of this was unquestionably wrong, but she’d grown to depend on his sexual attention in spite of how it had started. She didn’t know how Chani would react to any of that, so she held her silence and ate some of the bread so Chani would continue the conversation without waiting for her to speak.</p><p>“However, a good deal of the fault lies with me,” Chani said. “I felt we needed time apart from each other, but I should not have left as abruptly as I did. Even if time on our own was the right decision, I should have made sure he understood that he still had my heart. I should never have walked away like that just because of the argument we got into.”</p><p>Irulan swallowed her bread and took another drink of coffee, sensing that there was no need for her to speak right now. This was Chani’s story to tell, and she would tell it as she chose to and share with Irulan only that which she wanted her to know. Sure enough, Chani told her more while Irulan ripped off another section of bread and popped it into her mouth.</p><p>“I still love my Usul and I will remain at his side, but I won’t be moving back into his chambers imminently,” Chani said. “I will remain here for the time being. But while I’m sure you are interested in this, given what has happened between you and Muad’Dib while I was away, I did not actually call you here to discuss this. I asked you to join me today because I want to ask you a question.”</p><p>“I will answer as best I can,” Irulan said.</p><p>“Good.” Chani had been sipping at her coffee throughout this largely one-sided conversation, but she put it down on the table now and folded her hands on the table while regarding Irulan seriously. “Are you still loyal to the Bene Gesserit?”</p><p>“No,” Irulan said without any hesitation. She spoke firmly and clearly, and truthfully. She was done with the Bene Gesserit. Let them consider her a disappointment; she would do their bidding and be their pawn no longer.</p><p>“That is what Paul suspected,” Chani said, nodding her head. “Then I have another question for you, Irulan, one that you may hesitate longer to answer. You may even feel it would be a good idea to lie, but I must strongly urge you to answer truthfully. Whatever the answer may be, it would not upset me nearly as much as if you attempted to lie.”</p><p>Irulan nodded, hoping that her sudden nervousness did not show on her face. She had a feeling she knew what direction Chani was about to take with her questioning.</p><p>“How do you feel about your husband?” Chani asked quietly. Irulan did not miss that she referred to him as her husband, and felt sure that she had chosen that specific label deliberately, though she did not know what her ultimate goal was here.</p><p>Irulan hesitated for a moment. She knew what the truthful answer was, but wasn’t sure how Chani would take it. But she took Chani seriously when she said that nothing would upset her more than trying to lie.</p><p>“I care for him,” she confessed. It was simple, but truthful. Chani looked at her for several moments in silence, and she resisted the urge to squirm under the steady stare of those blue within blue eyes. But then Chani nodded and looked away, and the spell was broken.</p><p>“As I’ve said, Fremen do not hold the same ideas about monogamy that other cultures do,” Chani said. “I’ve told Paul that if he wants to continue sleeping with you, I will not object to it.”</p><p>Irulan couldn’t respond at first, too stunned to know what to say. After all these years of trying to entice Paul to turn away from Chani or at least sleep with her so she could bear his children, his Fremen lover had returned from her time away and given Irulan her permission to continue sleeping with him? This was highly unexpected.</p><p>“I suppose that will be up to him,” she said eventually. “But if you are giving your permission, I won’t refuse him.”</p><p>“I assumed as much,” Chani said. “I know things haven’t always been easy between us, but I want you to know that I’ve never hated you, and I’m hopeful that the two of us can become friends.”</p><p>“I would like that.” Friends weren’t just in short supply for Irulan but were effectively nonexistent. If she and Chani could form an unlikely friendship, Irulan would welcome it with open arms.</p><p>“I will say, however, that I will take your water without hesitation if you ever betray Paul,” Chani said. She didn’t raise her voice to make the threat, and in fact still had a welcoming smile on her face, but the words still struck home within Irulan. She knew that Chani wasn’t trying to intimidate her, not really. She was just letting her know exactly what would happen if Irulan went back on her word and acted against Paul’s interests. Taking someone’s water wasn’t a phrase that would necessarily hold much meaning to someone unfamiliar with the ways of Arrakis, but Irulan had lived on this planet and been around Fremen for too long not to understand exactly what that phrase meant. Irulan knew what Chani was trying to say. If she turned against Paul, if she reverted back to the Bene Gesserit and helped them in their schemes or worked alongside some other group in an effort to undermine her husband’s rule, Chani would kill her by her own hand if necessary.</p><p>Irulan swallowed another mouthful of coffee, trying to digest all of the changes happening in her life. She’d come here hoping to receive some answers, and she had, but in many ways she felt even more confused about where she stood with both Paul and Chani than she had before she entered the Fremen woman’s chambers.</p><p>--</p><p>Paul awaited the arrival of the Tleilaxu ambassador in his reception hall, Stilgar by his side faithfully. He’d chosen to leave both Chani and Irulan out of this meeting, though they’d be hearing all about it later. He wanted to meet this ambassador and get his measure on his own, though of course Stilgar would not stand for Muad’Dib meeting him alone.</p><p>The man was escorted in, and Paul watched his approach closely. Instantly he could tell that this man was not who he seemed to be.</p><p>“Thank you for meeting with me, Muad’Dib.” The man bowed low, and while he was trying to appear humble his eyes revealed far more than he likely intended. There was a dark, mocking humor there, but that wasn’t the most significant feeling Paul got from him. “My name is Scytale, and I come on behalf of the Tleilax Council of Masters. We wish to assure you that we had no part in the fortunately unsuccessful attempt made on your life.”</p><p>“I see,” Paul said, and he did see. As the man spoke he gave off the feeling of many people at once. It was as if his entire familial lineage was evident on his skin. ** “Welcome to Arrakeen, Scytale. I understand you have a gift for me?”</p><p>“Indeed I do, Sire,” the face dancer named Scytale said. “I offer my apologies, and the apologies of the Tleilax council for the assassination attempt concocted by a rogue Tleilax master. As I believe you have already been informed, we identified and executed the perpetrator, and I have brought you his head as proof.”</p><p>A bag was handed to one of Paul’s attendants, and at a nod from the emperor it was pulled off to reveal said head. Paul stared at it for a few moments before looking to Scytale, who was watching him expectantly and waiting for an answer.</p><p>“It’s certainly a head,” Paul said dryly. “But how am I to know it is truly the head of this rogue Tleilax master responsible for the assassination attempt? It’s not like I ever saw him or had any clue what he looked like. You could have presented any head to me and attempted to pass it off as belonging to the one responsible.”</p><p>“You wound me, Sire,” Scytale said. “I assure you that we have done no such thing. This is indeed the head of the one who was behind the attempt on your life; I can personally guarantee this.” He might actually be telling the truth on that. Paul didn’t believe for a second that this had been the work of one rogue Tleilax master, but it was possible they would have executed the one who had been charged with organizing the failed attack and presented his head to Paul. Either way, it made no difference. One head was the same as the other as far as Paul was concerned. He knew the Tleilax were behind the attack, and it almost certainly would not be their last attempt.</p><p>“I’m not accusing you of anything, of course,” Paul said calmly. “I’m merely pointing out that as I do not know what the perpetrator of the attack looked like, his head means nothing to me as far as identifying proof that you’ve rooted out the problem.”</p><p>“That is regrettably true,” Scytale said. “But as there is no hard and tangible evidence or confessions for us to present to you, you will have to take us at our word. Unless you wish to reject the Council’s claim and take the issue up with the Landsraad, of course.”</p><p>“No, no, of course not,” Paul said, waving his hand dismissively. “I have no proof and nothing to suggest that you’re being anything but truthful with me. Still, it <em>is </em>curious that I never saw the assassination attempt in my oracular vision.”</p><p>“That is indeed curious, Sire,” Scytale said. “I suppose even one as great as you is capable of making a mistake.” He kept his voice even, but the eyes betrayed him once again, as did the strange feeling of the genetic code of numerous other lives visible on his skin. Paul knew that he was likely unique in being able to notice that second factor, but he wondered if even someone without his abilities or the training of the Bene Gesserit would be able to tell this face dancer was lying and not what they seemed to be just based on the mockery in his eyes.</p><p>Stilgar stiffened beside him, though Paul assumed he would have been angry based solely on Scytale’s words whether he could see any of the things Paul could see or not. Paul gave his advisor a hand signal ordering him to calm down and say and do nothing.</p><p>“You aren’t wrong about that, Scytale,” Paul said, taking care to show no offense. “I have made mistakes despite my power, and when one such as I makes a mistake it tends to have far-reaching consequences. Still, I find it hard to accept that I would have seen nothing, not even a single hint of this plot. That I could misinterpret a vision of it is reasonable, but not seeing any hint of something so major? It’s most peculiar.”</p><p>“And do you have a different idea on how this oversight might have happened, Sire?” Scytale asked, appearing to be legitimately curious, though Paul knew it to be an act. “I would be thrilled to take any theories you might have back and present them to the rest of the Council.”</p><p>“I’ve pondered this for quite some time,” Paul said, pausing to make Scytale wait. “The only explanation that seems to make any sense to me is that this rouge Tleilax master who you’ve executed and presented to me today must have been working together with a Guild navigator who shielded him from my sight. I do wonder how a lone Tleilax master would have been able to get the services of a navigator from the Spacing Guild without being discovered, however.”</p><p>“I know nothing about that, but it will be my privilege to pose the question to the rest of the Council,” Scytale said smoothly. It was nonsense, Paul knew it, and he assumed that Scytale knew that he knew it or at least suspected it. “But I do hope the Council of Masters can answer any questions and remove any lingering doubt that you might understandably have. As such, it will be my pleasure to present another gift for you.”</p><p>“Oh? You didn’t bring me the body of a rogue Guild navigator, did you?” Paul asked, smiling. Scytale chuckled.</p><p>“No, I’m afraid not, Sire,” the face dancer said. “The gift is not in my possession today. It will be presented to you at the upcoming session of the Landsraad on Caladan, which I’m sure you will attend?”</p><p>“Of course,” Paul said. As if he was going to miss that Landsraad session after what had just happened in Sietch Ashar. “I will look forward to receiving my second gift at that time, though you really are being far too generous.”</p><p>“I believe that there is no such thing, at least not when it comes to you,” Scytale said, smiling. “I only hope that my second gift will prove my loyalty to you.”</p><p>“I have no doubt that it will,” Paul said. After a few moments of silence, he decided to bring the meeting to a close. “Was there anything else you wished to discuss, Scytale? Much as I would enjoy talking with you for the rest of the day, I do have many responsibilities as emperor.”</p><p>“Of course, of course. I shall not take up any more of your time, Sire. Thank you for receiving me with such hospitality and allowing me to bring the assurances of the Council of Masters to you. I hope you enjoy the gift, and I will look forward to seeing you again on Caladan.”</p><p>He nodded at Paul respectfully, and looked at Stilgar briefly before turning to leave the audience chamber. Paul rubbed his forehead as he watched the face dancer depart. His meeting with the ‘ambassador’ had gone exactly as well as he’d expected it to. </p><p>“Timeo danaos et dona ferentes,” Paul muttered after his attendants had led Scytale out of the reception hall. He’d been talking to himself, but Stilgar was still there with him. His former leader looked over at him curiously.</p><p>“What does that mean, Muad’Dib?” Stilgar asked. No surprise there; it wasn’t like Stilgar understood Latin.</p><p>“Its literal meaning is ‘I fear the Danaans, even those bearing gifts’,” Paul said. He didn’t bother adding that the Danaans were one of the ancient Greek tribes, or that they had besieged Troy. None of those names would hold any more meaning for Stilgar than the other. The Danaans, Greeks, Troy and Homer had all been lost to the passage of time.     </p><p>It wasn’t ancient history that mattered now anyway. It was what that ancient phrase meant that was relevant now. This first ‘gift’ of the Tleilax had been a useless gesture, a head that could have belonged to anyone. But he had a feeling the second gift would not be so benign. He did not know what they had planned, but he was confident they were not done trying to eliminate him. It would make sense for this second ‘gift’ to be something that they might use to help them accomplish that goal.</p><p>“Well that was informative,” Paul said, sitting up from his chair. “I believe I have earned myself some relaxation. And I know where I’m going to go to get it.”</p><p>He’d slept with Chani the previous night, after they’d shared dinner. She hadn’t stayed though; she’d gone back to her chambers at the end of the night, something that he understood even if it felt strange and would take some getting used to. But before she’d left she’d let him know that she had spoken to Irulan earlier that day and informed her of the decision they’d made. He hadn’t had a chance to see Irulan since, but now it was time to change that. His Sihaya had permitted him to continue visiting Irulan, and tonight he was going to make the most of it.</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan was staring down at the desk in her chambers, absorbed in her writing, when there was a knock on her door.</p><p>“Irulan? Can I come in?”</p><p>She smiled to herself, shaking her head for a second at how much things had changed. It wasn’t so long ago that Paul would have entered her chambers without knocking or announcing his presence in any way, and as soon as he was in he would have used her body however he wanted even if he had to wake her up to do so.</p><p>“You may,” she said. The door opened, and she turned around in her chair as he entered. “So I take it your meeting with the Tleilax ambassador is finished?”</p><p>“Yes, thankfully,” he said, sighing. Irulan was intrigued to know what had happened, but she wouldn’t demand answers. He would tell her what he wanted her to know.</p><p>As it turned out, he wanted her to know plenty. Paul went over the entire meeting with her in detail, and while she obviously hadn’t been there to judge for herself, she took Paul at his word and assumed that this Scytale really had been a face dancer. They’d all already believed that the Tleilax’s official response had been an obvious lie, and the details of this meeting only increased that belief. It was evident that Paul believed another attempt would be made to eliminate him, and if it didn’t happen on Caladan itself, this second ‘gift’ Scytale had spoken of would likely play into their plan somehow. It seemed to be a logical conclusion from Irulan’s point of view as well, and she not only told him so but promised to do whatever she could to help him. She was his wife, not to mention they’d tried to kill her as well in Sietch Ashar. For most of their marriage they had been strangers at best and adversaries at worst, but Irulan and Paul were on the same side now, and she would support him as best she could.</p><p>And Chani would as well, of course. Both of the women in Paul’s life would do what they could to thwart whatever this threat was. Theirs was an unlikely alliance, but she felt sure that between the three of them they would manage to turn the tables.</p><p>“So, Irulan, I have an important question to ask you,” Paul said after talk of Scytale and the Tleilax plot died down.</p><p>“Yes?” She sat up straighter in her chair, wondering what he might be about to ask her.</p><p>“Are you wearing any underwear today?” he asked. “And if so, what sort of underwear are you wearing?”</p><p>It was not the question she had been expecting, but it was one she had no problem answering. She decided not to answer him with words but instead simply show him the answer to both parts of his question. Irulan hiked up the skirt of her dress to show him that yes, she had taken advantage of the privilege he’d recently returned to her and was wearing something underneath her dress. But they weren’t the functional sort one might wear if they were concerned with convenience. Though she hadn’t known it for sure, she’d held out hope after her conversation with Chani the day before that Paul might call on her at some point today, and she’d dressed for the occasion just in case. As he now saw for himself, she was wearing a thin, skimpy set of underwear that were specifically designed to arouse him as soon as he saw them.</p><p>They were working as intended too, because she saw the look of lust in Paul’s eyes as he stared at her. Smiling, she decided to give him an even better look at what might be the best feature of this particular pair of underwear. She spun around in her chair so she was facing away from him and then hiked the dress up again, and now he could see that the underwear left her ass cheeks exposed. They truly were designed not for comfort or practicality but for seduction, and though she couldn’t see his face from this angle, Irulan knew they had to be doing the trick.</p><p>That question was conclusively answered when Paul reached over, pulled her body onto his lap and began to spank her. He didn’t even bother to remove her underwear before doing so, but he didn’t need to either. He could spank her hard enough to make her feel it even if her ass was fully covered, but with this flimsy excuse for underwear on his hand could connect with her bare skin without needing to take anything off.</p><p>Irulan moaned as he spanked her. It was exactly the way she’d hoped he would react, and she hadn’t needed to tell him so. They hadn’t actually talked about where they stood now that Chani was back. Obviously she’d had her conversation with Chani, and she would imagine that Chani had also informed Paul that she’d told Irulan about it, but there had been no communication between the two of them directly. But there didn’t need to be, at least not right now. Their bodies were doing their talking for them. They both knew they wanted this; they wanted to continue the affair that had started while Chani was away. And since Chani had given them both her permission there was really no reason for them to hold back.</p><p>Paul gave her somewhere around ten to twenty spanks across each cheek before he took her body in his arms and carried her over to her bed. She wrapped her arms around his neck and let him carry her, and sighed as he placed her down on top of her bed while climbing in with her. He moved her dress back out of the way, though he didn’t pull it off just yet. He <em>did </em>remove her underwear though, pulling them down her legs and tossing them aside. Irulan had no complaints about that, especially since he put his hands on her inner thighs, spread her legs and lowered his head.</p><p>Her husband giving her cunnilingus had previously been a very infrequent occurrence, and in fact had not happened at all after that first night when he’d taken her virginity. But it seemed like it had become a much more regular part of Irulan’s sex life with Paul since that day in the testing station, the day that had ended with the attempt on their lives. It was a very welcome change as far as Irulan was concerned. Paul was masterful with his mouth, and she relished having his attention on her. While she had come to enjoy being roughly fucked by him, having him licking her and focused solely on her pleasure was something Irulan would happily endure as often as Paul wanted to do it for her.</p><p>He knew exactly what she needed; he probably knew it so well that he could do it in his sleep by this point. That was a familiarity that Irulan could get behind wholeheartedly, and as Paul licked her clit and moved his fingers inside of her just as she liked, she found herself thankful to both her husband for showing her such attention, and to Chani for not only not standing in the way of it but actually encouraging Paul to continue with her. It had been more than Irulan could have hoped for when Paul’s Fremen lover returned out of the blue, and while there was still so much uncertainty about where all of this was headed, in the moment she was incredibly grateful for the pleasure she was receiving.</p><p>Chani might be back, but Paul’s attention was only on Irulan tonight, and he was giving her the same sort of incredible attention that she was very quickly finding herself becoming addicted to. She gasped and moaned as Paul licked her and fingered her just as he knew that she liked. It wasn't going to take long at all for him to make her scream out in pleasure, and that was assuredly the entire point. Irulan wasn't concerned with trying to hold on, and she didn't care about trying to hold back on revealing her pleasure. There was nothing to be ashamed of and no reason to hide how much she liked this anymore. Maybe others in the palace would still judge her and look down on her, but Chani had given her approval and that was enough for Irulan.</p><p>"Oh, yes!" Irulan cried as Paul's mouth and fingers got her off as skillfully as they always did. She squirmed around on the bed and had to resist grabbing onto his hair or bucking her hips up into his face as he made her orgasm. She wasn't sure if it was merely her imagination, but somehow the pleasure he always brought her with his mouth seemed to increase every single time he did this for her. She looked forward to putting that theory to the test in the days, weeks and months to come, so long as Paul was willing and Chani allowed all of this to continue. But for right now it was enough to simply enjoy the pleasure.</p><p>When Irulan finally came back down from that high point, Paul's hands were back on her dress. It had been enough simply to move it out of the way before, but now he wanted it gone entirely. He pulled the offending garment off of her body, though she was pleased to note that he did not discard it with quite the same carelessness that he'd flung her underwear across the room.</p><p>He wasted little time in running his hands along her body, groping her large ass and massive breasts possessively. Irulan moaned, happy to have his hands on her. He was welcome to be as possessive of her as he wanted to be. He could grope her ass or squeeze her breasts all night if he wanted to, and she would be perfectly content.</p><p>She knew where all of this was headed. There was really only one way it could go, because it wasn't like Paul would leave her room at this point without having fucked her, nor would she want him to. They kissed and his hands grabbed at her until he finally pulled back to take off his clothes. Irulan sat there, watched and licked her lips as her husband's body was revealed to her. His cock was hard, and she knew it would be going inside of her very soon, much to their mutual pleasure.</p><p>But before he could actually move her onto her back and get on top of her, or roll her over onto her hands and knees and fuck her from behind, or any of the other positions he might choose that would surely be enjoyable, Irulan decided to speak up. It wasn't that she didn't want this; she wanted it badly. But she wanted to try something else, something outside of any of their normal routines, and between the recent shift in her and Paul's relationship and Chani's approval of it continuing, she felt confident enough to speak up and ask for what she wanted.</p><p>"Paul, can I get on top of you this time?" she asked. He paused, looking surprised at her request.</p><p>"You want to be on top?" he asked. He wasn't used to her attempting to initiate anything or asking for certain positions, but Irulan felt like they had entered a new stage of their marriage, and she wanted to see if he would grant her this.</p><p>"I would," she said, nodding at him. "I think it'll be fun. And if I ride you, my breasts are going to be bouncing all over the place. You'd like that, wouldn't you?"</p><p>As if she even needed to ask! The visual brought a smile to his face, as she'd known it would. He nodded, and whether he simply decided to humor her and give her what she wanted or if the idea of watching her breasts bounce along with her sealed the deal, Paul moved onto his back and pulled her down on top of him.</p><p>"Go for it," Paul said, smiling up at her. "Let's see what you can do."</p><p>Irulan positioned herself over his cock and slid him inside of her eagerly. She'd been thinking about this for awhile now, and was pleased to finally have the chance to try it out. She quickly found that she liked it quite a bit, especially when she started to move. He had far more experience handling all of the movement, and while he was undeniably great at it, she was happy to get the chance to take a turn at it herself.</p><p>There was just something about being on top of her lover and being in control of everything that really appealed to her. All went as she wanted it to. If she wanted to move her hips from side to side on him, or rotate them in a circle, she could do that. If she wanted to rock her body back and forth, all she had to do was put her body in motion. And if she wanted to ride him hard, well, that was as simple as putting her hands on his muscular chest and bouncing up and down on him as quickly as she could. Whatever Irulan wanted to do, she could do. For someone who had felt such a lack of control in her life for the last several years, this feeling of control was a welcome change for her.</p><p>It also helped that it felt amazing. Paul's cock always felt amazing inside of her, of course, but there was definitely something to be said for having the ability to move her body however she wanted to and deciding how hard and fast she fucked him. She wouldn't ever get tired of having Paul fuck her, and she knew that she would be right there moaning and screaming in pleasure the next time he got on top of her and fucked her hard. But she loved driving herself down onto him and feeling her ass smack against his legs, and watching his eyes track the movement of her breasts. With how closely he followed them, it seemed that the show was every bit as fun for him as she'd promised it would be.</p><p>She loved hearing the bed creak beneath them and knowing that it was <em>her </em>doing the movement and causing that sound for a change. She'd been fucked hard in this bed too many times to count by her dominant husband and his big dick, but being the one doing the fucking was a fun switch for her. It seemed like it was a fun time for him as well, because he had a smile on his face the entire time, he didn't make any complaints and he never made any attempt to reverse their positions or take control of the encounter. His hands would alternate between resting on her hips, squeezing her ass, rubbing her breasts and stroking her tummy, but at no point did he try to hold her down or guide her movement on him. He didn't even make any requests or suggestions on how he wanted her to move; he just sat back and allowed Irulan to do whatever she wanted.</p><p>Irulan took advantage of that opportunity, to their mutual pleasure. This was her first real chance to get on top and try things out for herself, and she didn't know when she would have this sort of opportunity again so she wanted to make the most of it. She tried out a variety of different speeds, angles and motions, but in the end a simple, hard up and down felt like the most appealing option for her (and since Paul moaned so loudly and seemed to love how her breasts bounced when she moved like this, she could only assume it was working out well for him too.) Towards the end she stopped testing out different things and just repeatedly drove her body down onto Paul's. The sound of their skin slapping, his grunts and her moans would easily be heard by anyone who walked by her chambers, but Irulan didn't care. She was his wife, but more importantly in a practical sense she had Chani's approval to keep on doing this. Let the entire palace hear them.</p><p>She kept going, moaning and smiling as she felt her orgasm approach. Usually when this time came she'd have to either plead with Paul to keep it up and give it to her harder or just hope that he would be able to tell she was close and do all that he needed to in order to give her a big finish. This time it was Irulan who was in control though, so when she felt her body crying out for more she simply forced her body to move even faster and harder. It was to the point that she was launching herself up and down on Paul's body with more strength than she'd even known she was capable of. She'd been taught the art of seduction by the Bene Gesserit, but this wasn't seduction, and she wasn't attempting to give him sensual pleasure. Irulan moved with a single-minded purpose, and all that she was concerned with was bringing herself pleasure.</p><p>Doing so also brought Paul pleasure; when she came around him with a scream, his hands tightened on her hips and he grunted while filling her with his seed. Irulan smiled down at him; even though she'd been worried only about finding her own satisfaction, she was still happy he'd been able to have fun too.</p><p>There was still so much left to be determined about how all of this was going to work out. Irulan did not know what was in store for her relationship with Paul. Would they continue on roughly as they had been, with Paul seeking her out for pleasure but ensuring that she was fed contraceptives so she could not get pregnant? Was he even still feeding her those contraceptives, and if so, was he going to continue to do so and only give Chani the honor of bearing his children? She nearly asked him those questions, but instead he climbed off of him and settled in beside him on her bed. He wrapped his arm around her and pulled her to him, and she smiled.</p><p>Irulan might not know where this was going, but she was sure of one thing: she would be taking Chani's offer. The Tleilax and whoever else wanted to take a shot at Muad'Dib would have both his Fremen lover and his wife to contend with.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Homecoming</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Paul and his ladies travel to Caladan for the Landsraad meeting. Irulan and Jessica have a frank conversation, Paul and Chani explore new territory, and receives a promised gift.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>"Hello, Guildsman," Scytale said as he sat down across from Edric on the guild heighliner. Edric, the Guild Navigator who was representing the Spacing Guild in this endeavor and was shielding the conspiracy against the Atreides Empire from Paul's oracular vision, munched on melange in his tank filled with spice.</p><p>"Scytale," Edric said by way of greeting, before getting straight to the point. "How did your meeting with Paul Atreides go?"</p><p>"About as could be expected," the Face Dancer answered. "He doesn't seem to believe our story that the attempt made on his life was carried out solely by a lone Tleilax master who went rogue."</p><p>"Of course he doesn't," Edric said.</p><p>"He also actively suspects that the Spacing Guild is involved in the plot against him," Scytale added. Edric was silent for a moment as he considered this.</p><p>"Your conspiracy plot doesn't seem to be going very well," the humanoid fish in the tank commented. "Princess Irulan abandoning the Bene Gesserit before you could get her involved in the plot against her husband would have been a large enough blow all by itself, but now the Sisterhood itself has decided not to get involved at all."</p><p>"A mistake on their part," Scytale said. "They're not going to get what they want if they're relying on Muad'Dib's whims."</p><p>"Are you sure?" asked the Navigator as she swam around in his tank filled with orange gas. "They want an heir, and the chances of getting one seem to have increased significantly with the Princess no longer spiking the Fremen concubine's food with contraceptives."</p><p>"Which does them no good," Scytale objected. "If Chani birthing an heir did them any good in their schemes, there would have been no need for Irulan to give her the contraceptives in the first place. It's Irulan who they want to breed with Muad'Dib for the sake of preserving their breeding program."</p><p>"And it's common knowledge by now that the Emperor has been sleeping with his wife recently," Edric said. "Whether he intends to reproduce with her or not, the simple reality that he is now fornicating with her gives the Sisterhood the hope that they need. From their perspective, it's easy to see why they would feel hoping that Irulan will birth an heir for Paul Atreides is preferable to throwing their support behind your conspiracy."</p><p>"Even if Irulan did give him an heir, it wouldn't bring an end to the Jihad," Scytale said.</p><p>"Can you be sure of that?" Scytale asked. "If she does produce an heir, perhaps that heir will drift away from the Fremen religious fanaticism that has been so prevalent in the Atreides reign so far. The Sisterhood may not be the only group who need to rethink whether involving itself in this plot is in their best interests. Perhaps the Guild would be better off removing itself as well."</p><p>"That seems like a lot of presumption," Scytale said. "And even it winds up being true, it's not like Muad'Dib will be relinquishing his power any time soon unless we act. Is the Guild really content to continue operating as a taxi service for Muad'Dib's Fremen legions as they brutalize the rest of the universe for the next one hundred years, at a minimum?"</p><p>His words irritated Edric, as they were intended to. The Navigator had been poking and prodding him the entire time, and Scytale wouldn't allow it to go on.</p><p>"And what are your plans going forward then?" Edric demanded to know. "Your assassination attempt at Sietch Ashar was a failure, and now the Emperor knows that the Tleilaxu and the Guild are plotting against him. How do you intend to see your plan succeed now that he knows to expect treachery?"</p><p>"That's simple," Scytale said, and he allowed himself to smile now. "I will bestow upon Paul Atreides a gift which he will immediately know and recognize to be a trap, and yet he will not have the heart to refuse it. He will see it for what it is and know that it is a trap, and yet emotional weakness will cause him to knowingly step right into the trap."</p><p>Edric realized what this gift was. They'd discussed it before, but it hadn't been intended for use yet.</p><p>"How can this be ready for use?" the Navigator said, sounding somewhat shocked. "When we discussed it previously you told me that it would be years before the ghola would be ready."</p><p>"I did," Scytale said, nodding. "It's not ideal, and I would have preferred to have more time to prepare the ghola before giving it to Muad'Dib. But the failed assassination attempt, Irulan growing closer to Muad'Dib and the Bene Gesserit refusing to get involved have all changed our circumstances. It's vital that this particular plot be brought to bear against the Atreides as soon as possible, especially since, as you have pointed out, Muad'Dib may very well have an heir soon."</p><p>He waited to see how Edric would respond, but the Navigator said nothing. The representative of the Spacing Guild was no doubt weighing the benefits and risks associated with the involvement of the plot and how things were changing, trying to determine what was in the best interests of the Guild. Since he seemed in no hurry to speak. Scytale decided to fill the silence.</p><p>"All that I require of you is for you to continue to shield the plot from the emperor's oracular sight," Scytale said. "I will take care of the rest." He needed Edric to agree. Missing out on Irulan's participation and losing the Bene Gesserit were both blows to the plan, but losing the Guild and its Navigator would be catastrophic to their hopes of success.</p><p>"Very well," the Navigator said, floating in his tank. "You will continue to have my support." Scytale gave an inward sigh of relief. If the Guild was still on board, they could still make this work. "I must say that there is something that has unnerved me since the Fedaykin brutalized Seprek."</p><p>"Oh?" Now that he had Edric's continued support confirmed, Scytale allowed himself to stop worrying and indulge the Navigator's concerns. "And what's that?"</p><p>"Ever since then, I've had this feeling. It's as if I have lived this portion of my life before," Edric said. Scytale looked at him strangely, but Edric ignored him. "Only something has changed. Something important."</p><p>--</p><p><em>Three Standard Weeks Later</em>   </p><p>Traveling on a heighliner could often be boring, Paul had found. But the boredom could be alleviated significantly with the right traveling companion to spend your time with, and as traveling companions went, he couldn't ask for much better than this.</p><p>He straddled his wife's upper body and thrust his hips back and forth, sliding his cock between Irulan's massive breasts. She did all that she could to help him and make the experience even more pleasurable for him, holding the sides of her breasts and squeezing them together around his cock. He'd applied lotion to her chest to offer more friction, and it had been a wise idea.</p><p>How strange to be returning to Caladan, his original home, like this, married to one woman, his heart pledged to another, and fucking them both with their full knowledge and approval.</p><p>Chani was on board the heighliner as well, though she was not in the room with them presently. She was back in the room she shared with Paul and getting some rest before they landed, and he'd come down to Irulan's room to pass the time with her. She'd welcomed him with a willing and happy smile, so different to how things had always been between them until recently. It had been a wild three weeks, and though he hoped that this arrangement would continue indefinitely, he would make the most of each moment he had with both Irulan and Chani just in case.</p><p>His breathing got harsher and his hips moved faster as he felt himself getting close, and Irulan just smiled wider and played with her breasts, rubbing them against his cock. He came with a grunt, and while the majority of his cum wound up collecting in her cleavage or on her breasts, a couple of spurts arced up near her throat.</p><p>Irulan cleaned up after he was done, with his help, and not long after she got clean they were orbiting over Caladan and it was time to head down.</p><p>“Ready to go?” he asked, looking at her as she finished getting dressed.</p><p>“Ready,” she said. She did a fairly good job of hiding her nervousness, and had he not had all of his training he probably wouldn’t have been able to tell how nervous she actually was. He decided to try and lighten the mood with a bit of teasing.</p><p>“Interesting hat,” he said, eyeing the garish thing atop his wife’s head. It was a frilly, pointy thing that caught the eye immediately, and not in a good way. Irulan normally had impeccable fashion sense, but this was a poor choice.</p><p>“Yes, I think so too,” she said. He doubted she’d missed the little dig; she had the Bene Gesserit training too, and he hadn’t really been trying to hide it. She didn’t react to it though. “There was never a call to wear it on Arrakis, but I decided it might be more fitting here on Caladan.”</p><p>“I’m not sure it would be fitting anywhere,” Paul said, but he said nothing more on the matter. If she wanted to wear this silly hat when she was received by his mother, he wouldn’t stop her.</p><p>He and Irulan met left her room and met up with Chani, who was just coming out of the room she and Paul shared. She looked refreshed and happy, and smiled when she saw them approaching.</p><p>“Did you rest well, Chani?” he asked. She nodded.</p><p>“Very well,” she said pleasantly. “And I’m sure you two found pleasant ways to pass the time while I got my rest.” She said it without a hint of anger or jealousy, because the Fremen really didn’t concern themselves with the idea of monogamy. Paul had just fucked his wife while his lover slept, she knew it and was not bothered by it in the least. She’d only said it to tease Irulan, who she delighted in playfully embarrassing. Sure enough, there was a flicker of a blush from Irulan before she schooled herself. Paul chuckled and led his wife and his lover towards their destination.</p><p>The trio was joined by the majority of the retinue that had made the trip from Arrakis, and the group took a transporter down to the planet's surface. They arrived in a vast summer palace on a tropical island, and both Chani and Irulan looked around in fascination. Paul joined them. It had been a little while since he'd been able to make it back to the planet that he'd grown up on, and this palace was a new addition built by his mother after she had returned to Caladan five years ago.</p><p>"It's so different from home," Chani murmured, looking around constantly.</p><p>"It is," he agreed. Though Arrakis itself was far different than it had been when he arrived, it still wasn't the home he'd left when Irulan's father took the fiefdom of Caladan away from the Atreides and 'gifted' them with Dune instead.</p><p>He thought back on the past as they arrived, thinking of how different things had been when Caladan was his home. He'd lost much more than just his home. The 'gift' of Dune had been a slight, and his father Duke Leto had known it was a slight, but it had been much more than that. Emperor Shaddam conspired with the Harkonnens to try and wipe the Atreides out, and they'd very nearly succeeded. They'd killed Duke Leto and most of his men, but Paul and Lady Jessica survived, and while on the run ran into Stilgar and the Fremen who would eventually make up the force of his rebellion.</p><p>He'd left this planet a boy, and the heir to Duke Leto of the Atreides family, an important family but ultimately just part of the Landsraad. Now he returned as an emperor--a conqueror.</p><p>How ironic that he returned here for a meeting of the Landsraad after another attempt had been made on his life. Gaining the power of an emperor had not made him any less of a target of treachery. If anything he was a far bigger target now.</p><p>But he wasn't the boy he'd been. He'd embraced and learned how to use his unique gifts now, and that wasn't even counting the Fremen legions he had at his command. If the Guild or the Tleilaxu thought they were going to succeed where Shaddam and the Harkonnens had failed, he intended to teach them the error of their ways.</p><p>--</p><p>The Lady Jessica was there to meet them as they arrived in the entrance hall, and Irulan fought to contain her nervousness. This was the first time she'd left Arrakis since the change in her relationship with Paul, not to mention Chani's return and shocking acceptance of Irulan's integration into their life. Things were going well so far, but she didn't know what Paul's mother would say or think about all that had happened.</p><p>"Paul," Jessica said fondly, stepping forward to greet him.</p><p>"Mother," he said, with more tenderness in his voice than Irulan was used to hearing. He sounded more like a boy than the man, the emperor he'd grown up to be.</p><p>She looked away as mother and son embraced, feeling like she was intruding on a private moment. Unbidden the thought came to her mind that there was a family member missing from this reunion on the planet that had been their home, and that family member had been killed in a plot which <em>her </em>father had helped facilitate. Irulan hadn't had any involvement in that plot, but hopefully her presence here on Caladan wouldn't lead to any unpleasant memories for the Lady Jessica or her son.</p><p>The Lady Jessica greeted the rest of her guests as well, but she paid more attention to Irulan than anyone else. It was doubtful anyone else would have noticed since she was being rather subtle about it, but Irulan’s Bene Gesserit training allowed her to pick up on it. She wasn’t sure how to feel about it. Whether it was an encouraging thing or if it boded ill for her, Lady Jessica had her eyes on her as she gave the group a brief tour of the palace.</p><p>The tour ended with a dinner, where she was seated next to Paul. He was placed between her and Chani, and directly across from his mother. The Lady Jessica sat beside Gurney Halleck, who, as was no secret to Irulan, had become her lover. She was not openly affectionate with Halleck during dinner, either due to not wanting to upset Paul or because she was too focused on being a good host. The food was excellent, but she resisted eating too quickly. Dinner, like everything else on this planet, was a chance for Irulan to both make an impression and gather information. She knew she had nothing to fear from anyone currently gathered here, because obviously the Lady Jessica and her people were not part of any plot to overthrow Paul Atreides. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t learn a thing or two about how they were feeling about the upcoming Landsraad meeting, or about her new place in Paul’s life.</p><p>Chani seemed quite comfortable in the presence of Paul’s mother, but Irulan supposed she had no reason to feel otherwise. Irulan might be his wife, but Chani was the woman who had always held his heart. And why wouldn’t the Lady Jessica identify with her son’s Fremen concubine? After all, she’d never been the Duke Leto’s wife despite being the only woman in his life.</p><p>Some of the others began to slowly depart after finishing their food, and after a significant look between the Lady Jessica and her lover, Gurney said his farewells, promised to speak to Paul later and then left.</p><p>Eventually it was down to just Irulan, Paul, Chani and the Lady Jessica herself. Jessica finished eating first but waited on the rest of them, as any good host would. Irulan finished next, and she did her best not to show any reaction to the attention Jessica was paying her.</p><p>She was relieved when she saw Paul and Chani finish. Hopefully now she could leave with them and prepare for tomorrow, when the others who would attend the Landsraad meeting would begin arriving on Caladan. But she would need to observe basic social standards, of course.</p><p>“Thank you very much for the meal, Lady Jessica,” Irulan said. “The food was delicious.”</p><p>“Thank you, Irulan,” she said, smiling. “I imagine you don’t have a chance to eat fish on Arrakis very often.”</p><p>“Certainly not,” Paul said. “I miss it. Thank you for this reminder of home.”</p><p>“Of course, Paul,” she said gently. “You will always have a place here.” It was left unspoken that his Fremen crusaders were <em>not </em>welcome on Caladan. She had made it clear that she did not want her home, the childhood home of Muad’Dib, to be dragged into the Jihad, and Paul had honored that wish.</p><p>“I thank you for that,” he said. “I only wish I could visit more often.”</p><p>“As do I,” Lady Jessica said, “but I understand. I know how busy your father always was, and he was only a duke. Being the emperor keeps you even more busy.”</p><p>“Yes it does,” Paul said. “And I suppose I should also head back to my room now and prepare myself for tomorrow.”</p><p>“Of course,” Jessica said. “The room has been prepared for you.”</p><p>Paul rose from his chair and helped Chani out of hers, then held his hand out to Irulan to do the same for her. Just before she could take her husband’s hand and allow him to pull her up, though, Jessica spoke again.</p><p>“Actually, Irulan, would you stay behind with me?” Jessica asked. “I’d like to talk with you about the recent changes in your life.”</p><p>There could be no mistaking what she was talking about. Irulan looked up at Paul, who just shrugged at her.</p><p>“It would be my pleasure,” she said, settling back down in her seat. It wasn’t a conversation she was really looking forward to having, but she supposed it had to be done sooner or later.</p><p>Paul and Chani departed, and from the smile she shot him Irulan had a feeling they were about to take advantage of their private time together. She couldn’t begrudge them that, especially not after she’d had her own time with Paul earlier while Chani was sleeping. She was entitled to time with her lover. Irulan had her own business to deal with. She hoped to reach some kind of accord with Lady Jessica.</p><p>“I have been in touch with Chani over the past few weeks,” Jessica began once they were alone. “Naturally she has told me all about the changes between the three of you.”</p><p>“I see.” Irulan had expected as much, and it wasn’t like any of it was much of a secret anyway. But what she didn’t know was how Jessica felt about it, and she could glean absolutely nothing from her voice, her facial expression or her body language. Irulan had Bene Gesserit training, but she was nowhere near Lady Jessica. She would have to wait for Jessica to tell her whatever was on her mind.</p><p>“You’re like me now,” Jessica commented.</p><p>“Oh?” That wasn’t what Irulan had been expecting her to say. “I’m afraid I don’t understand.” If she’d thought Jessica would compare herself to either of the women in Paul’s life, it would have been Chani, the woman who held his heart despite not being his wife.</p><p>“You abandoned the Bene Gesserit, just like I did,” Jessica said. She smiled, and Irulan felt the tension ease at least a little bit.</p><p>“I guess I did,” Irulan said. Her reasons had been different from Jessica’s, but she’d made the same choice regardless. Maybe that could serve as common ground for them to share, in addition to the obvious fact that they both wanted to protect Paul.</p><p>“Are you enjoying the recent changes in your relationship with my son?” Jessica asked. “I’m sure the previous years were not easy on you.”</p><p>“No, they were not,” Irulan acknowledged. “And yes, I am much happier now.” And she was, in spite of how it had begun. She was very happy to have the companionship she now shared with Paul. “I’m very grateful, to Paul and to Chani both.”</p><p>“Yes, I’m very proud of Chani for accepting you in so readily,” Jessica said. “I know the Fremen have different ideas about this type of thing, but I still admire her strength in accepting this polyamorous relationship. I always wonder if I would have been able to accept it if Paul’s father had ever married another woman. The possibility was always there, since we never married, but he never did so for my sake. Would I have been as readily accepting as Chani has been of you? I’m not so sure.”</p><p>It was an unconventional arrangement to be sure. Obviously Jessica was referring less to the formal marriage between Paul and Irulan, which for years had been a mere legal marriage made for political reasons and only existed in theory, and more to the recent addition of intimacy. Irulan was glad that Chani had accepted it and allowed Paul to continue on much as he had been with her.</p><p>“Still, I wonder if you three are going to be able to maintain this long term,” Jessica said. Something must have shown on Irulan’s face, because Jessica continued on quickly. “Please understand that I’m not trying to discourage you. I want what is best for my son, and if this works out, I’m happy for all three of you. It might even keep the Bene Gesserit off of your back. But relationships are complicated even between two people. I can’t imagine how much more complicated it would be with three of you.”</p><p>“I do take your point,” Irulan said. “I believe it beats the alternative though.”</p><p>“Does it bother you that Chani will likely always have his heart?” Jessica asked bluntly. Irulan wasn’t quite prepared for such a blunt statement, and it bothered her more than she expected. She’d always known Paul loved Chani, after all, and even once she’d started to enjoy the shift in her relationship with Paul it had still been a physical thing. But her feelings changed rapidly by the day, and she could admit at least to herself that the thought of her never being as important to Paul as Chani currently did bothered her. She didn’t let it show on her face though, nor would she say anything to give it away.</p><p>“As long as Paul treats me with affection and respect, I don't mind," she said out loud. "I can't complain if Chani always holds his heart. She had his love before I ever even met him, even if I became his 'wife.' If things continue on as they are now, I'll have no complaints."</p><p>Jessica stared at her, silently reading her, and Irulan forced herself not to fidget or grimace. Eventually she passed the test and Jessica nodded.</p><p>"Okay," she said, sitting back in her chair. "I really do hope things work out well for all three of you; I want you to know that. Since I am here on Caladan, it would be nice to know that Paul has another woman with Bene Gesserit training by his side with him back on Arrakis to protect him and look out for his best interests even if I'm away."</p><p>--</p><p>"Yes, Paul! Yes, lick me! Oh, Usul, your tongue is so good!"</p><p>Chani was not shy about expressing her pleasure as Paul licked her, and that was something he was perfectly fine with. Their room had a decent amount of privacy, but she was being loud enough that he wouldn't be surprised if they were overheard. But again, that was no problem for him. It was mainly those who had come with him from Arrakis that had been placed in rooms near theirs, and if any of his mother's people happened to pass by, well, let them hear the former heir of Caladan pleasing his lover so well that she could not contain her excitement.</p><p>Finally adding a physical, sexual element to his marriage with Irulan had done a splendid job of keeping Paul satisfied while Chani was away, but he was very glad to have his Sihaya back in his life and in his bed. And he'd been lucky enough that she'd let him continue on with Irulan as well, which was a wondrous gift. Now he had both his wife and his longtime lover to share his bed with, and it was working out shockingly well so far.</p><p>Chani really had no issues at all with sharing him with Irulan. It was a Fremen thing, but he also felt that Chani accepting that Irulan actually did want to be by his side and help him had a lot to do with it. She trusted that Irulan would help him in her own way, and also that he would not lose interest in her just because he now slept with his wife as well.</p><p>She was completely right in that, and had every reason to feel secure in the knowledge that she would always hold his interest. He loved everything he did with Irulan, and had found release in her perfect body earlier that very day while his lover slept, but that didn't change anything about how he felt about Chani. He would never tire of sharing his bed with her and making love to her, or burying his face between her thighs and licking her. He was happy to hear her moan as he moved his tongue inside of her and rubbed her with his fingers, and pleased that she felt so good that she grabbed at his hair and pulled hard. Chani deserved all that he could give her, and that was why he forgot about all else, whether it be Irulan, his mother, being back home on Caladan, the looming Landsraad meeting, the plot of the Tleilaxu and the Spacing Guild and everything else and gave her his full and undivided attention. All of the other concerns of the galaxy could wait until tomorrow, because right now all that he cared about was Chani.</p><p>He kept licking her until she gasped, tugged on his hair harder and came against his face with a cry of <em>"Usul!"</em> He kept his head between her legs until he was sure she was finished, and then pulled back, sat on his heels and grinned as he watched her breathe deeply on the bed. She looked as at home as she did in their own bed back in Arrakeen, and why shouldn't she? Dune had been her home for all of her life and it always would be, but she would be welcome wherever in the universe he happened to be. She might not be his wife but she'd been accorded all the respect she was due by her mother and her people, exactly as she should be. No matter where his relationship with Irulan stood, Chani would never be replaced.</p><p>"Did you enjoy that, Sihaya?" he asked, smiling at her, leaning over her and tracing her belly with his fingertips. Her body was much different than Irulan's; Irulan had large breasts, a (pleasantly) big and plump ass and a frame to match her generous gifts, while Chani was much skinnier. Rather than constantly stack them up side by side, he simply enjoyed them both for who they were. He loved Irulan's body, and in all honesty she was the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen, which was exactly what she was supposed to be after thousands of years of the Bene Gesserit breeding program. But he loved Chani's slim body and elfin features as well. She might not have the breeding, the genetics that the Bene Gesserit were looking for in his partner, but that didn't lessen his desire for her at all. She was his beloved.</p><p>She laughed, and her face lit up in a smile. "I'd answer you, but I think anyone staying in either of the rooms beside us would be able to answer for me if you went out and asked them." He chuckled.</p><p>"You're probably not wrong," he agreed. He settled down beside her in the bed, wrapping his arm around her thin body and kissing the side of her neck. She ran her hands through his hair slowly.</p><p>"So, are you planning to fuck me tonight, Paul?" she asked.</p><p>"If you want me to," he said. He had decided not to press the issue or ask for her to take care of him tonight; they'd had fun together last night, and he'd also gotten plenty of satisfaction with Irulan earlier today just before reaching Caladan while Chani slept, so it didn't seem fair for him to press his luck as far as that went. But if Chani was offering, he obviously wasn't going to turn her down.</p><p>"I actually had something in mind," she said. She put her arms around him and leaned over him. "I wanted to try something new."</p><p>"Something new?" he said, perking up. He had no complaints whatsoever about any of the things he and Chani did together. They had a very active sex life, and he was always satisfied when they were done. If she wanted to do a little experimentation, though, he was more than willing to go along with her.</p><p>"Yeah," she said. "Well, it's not so new for you, I guess, but it's new for me. You've done it with your wife several times, but never with me. And I think it's only fair that I get whatever she does."</p><p>"By all means," he said. "What did you have in mind?" It was true that there were plenty of things he'd done with Irulan but not with Chani, and while he didn't give Chani detailed descriptions of every last thing he did with his wife, he had told her some of it. And who knew what she might have heard from others, perhaps even Irulan herself. He was very curious to see what specific activity he'd done with Irulan that had picked his Fremen lover's interest.</p><p>"I want you to try taking my ass," Chani said. When Paul said nothing due to still trying to absorb what she'd just said, she got impatient. "Well? What do you think?"</p><p>"Are you sure?" he finally forced himself to say. He'd been lost in his own head with the sudden vision of fucking his lover's ass, and it had led to him being unable to respond to her. He'd never even considered asking Chani for this, either before she'd left or after she'd come back, but now that she'd put the idea in his head he knew he would be able to think of little else until he actually did it. But he didn't want her to force herself to do this just because she knew he'd done it with Irulan and enjoyed it greatly.</p><p>"Of course I am," she said confidently. "Why? Are you telling me you don't want to do it with me? Is only Irulan good enough to take it up her ass?" she teased.</p><p>"It's more that you mean so much to me that it never even crossed my mind," he said.</p><p>"And Irulan <em>doesn't </em>mean anything to you?" Chani asked, looking at him skeptically.</p><p>"She didn't when I first touched her," he said, his mood dropping as he thought about his initial treatment of Irulan. "I didn't care what she wanted back then; I just took it."</p><p>"But you haven't stopped having anal sex with her, right?" Chani asked, seeking confirmation.</p><p>"No, I haven't," he admitted. "By the time things changed between us, I think we were both used to it."</p><p>"So let me get used to it too," Chani said. She rolled over onto her belly, then pushed up onto her hands and knees while facing away from him. His Fremen lover wiggled her hips, shaking her perky little ass in his direction. "Unless it's only Irulan's body that can tempt you?"</p><p>"Oh, there's no worries there, trust me," he said, and he wasn't lying. Her ass might be much smaller than his wife's but seeing Chani's wiggling hips still left him excited very quickly. Taking her ass wasn't something he'd planned on doing or expected to do, but if she was offering and she was sure he was definitely going to take her up on it.</p><p>He stripped off what remained of his clothing quickly, and Chani laughed when she heard it. He hadn't answered her in words, really, but he'd made his intentions clear in another way. Paul settled into position behind her, and when he first touched her ass he was surprised at what he found.</p><p>"Did you prepare yourself ahead of time?" he asked. Chani laughed. "You've had this in mind for a while, haven't you?"</p><p>"From the first time you told me you'd done this with Irulan, I knew I wanted to give it a try too," she said. "So I asked around and got some advice. I wanted to try and do it before we left, but with all of the preparations for this trip there wasn't really time. Then I figured it would be fun to do it here. Kind of like a welcome back to your old home planet. Irulan took your first time with this, but I could take your first time on Caladan."</p><p>"My first time doing <em>anything </em>sexual on Caladan," he said. "Well, anything sexual with someone else at least." He'd left the planet a boy, and returned a man, an emperor, with two lovers. My how things had changed for Paul Atreides.</p><p>He put one hand on Chani's hip and used the other to position his cock at her rear. He paused there for a moment, giving her a final chance to back out if she suddenly changed her mind. But he should have known better than to think she would turn away from this now. This had been on her mind to try for weeks now hearing her tell it, and aside from that he'd never known her to be someone to approach anything timidly. Chani was bold and brave, and fierce. A little bit of anal sex wasn't going to be anything that his Fremen lover couldn't handle. He pushed forward and penetrated her ass.</p><p>He'd taken Irulan's anal virginity, and now he was fortunate enough to do the same to Chani. She gasped as his cock slid inside of her, but she didn't groan or plead for mercy, and nor had he expected her to. Chani was made of stern stuff; she could take it. He did take it easy on her first, or easier than he had when he broke Irulan in at least, but this was as much out of necessity as anything else. Chani was <em>tight</em>. Her small, perky little ass was even tighter than Irulan's had been the first time he fucked it. It was the tightest hole he'd ever been inside, though the lubrication she'd applied did help some in allowing him to push forward.</p><p>Paul couldn't even imagine how much more difficult this would have been without the aid of the lubrication, because it was a snug fit even with it. But the difficulty of making her tight butt accommodate his large cock was the best sort of challenge as far as Paul was concerned. It was one he would be happy to repeat over and over again, as often as she wanted to allow him to do so.</p><p>He couldn’t help but think about how it felt when he fucked Irulan’s ass, but not in a competitive way of weighing one against the other. It was more about just appreciating the differences that both of them offered. When taking Irulan’s ass he appreciated watching her plump flesh jiggle and squeezing it in his hands, and while taking Chani’s rear he enjoyed how tight and compact everything was. There was no need for him to worry about choosing which he preferred, because both of these women were in his life and were okay with him enjoying the other. Curves or tightness, bountiful flesh or a perky ass; he didn’t need to choose. He could have whatever he wanted.</p><p>Right now, while Irulan was busy having what was probably an awkward conversation with his mother, what Paul wanted was to enjoy sharing this first bout of anal sex with Chani. There were so few firsts left for them sexually; they’d done so much and had so much fun in their years together. That just made it all the more fun on a night like tonight where they tried out something new, and anal sex was about as big a new adventure as they could engage in.</p><p>“How is it, Paul?” Chani asked. “Do you like it?”</p><p>“I love it,” he said, continuing to work his hips back and forth. “You’re so tight, Chani. <em>So </em>tight.”</p><p>“Not too tight?” she questioned.</p><p>“Absolutely not,” he said. “It’s just right.” He gave her a playful slap on one perky ass cheek, and she moaned.</p><p>“You can move faster if you want, you know,” she offered.</p><p>“Are you sure?” he asked. He’d been getting into more of a steady motion over the last couple of minutes as he grew more accustomed to sliding back and forth and fucking his longtime lover’s tight ass, but he hadn’t known whether or not he should try to move any faster with her. He knew what the ideal pace to use in anal sex with Irulan was by now, what would feel great for him while not pushing her harder than she was comfortable with. But as long as he and Chani had been together, this was brand new territory for them, and her body was very different from Irulan’s, not to mention the general nature of sex with Chani wasn’t as hard or demanding as he had been with Irulan at the beginning and continued to be even now that things had changed between them. Could Chani take the same kind of pace he used when he really got into fucking his wife’s ass?</p><p>“I’m sure,” she said confidently. “You think I can’t take a little bit of pain, Usul? Don’t forget who I am. I’m Fremen. I can take whatever you give me. If you want to move harder, move harder.”</p><p>Well if she was going to all but demand that he fuck her hard, who was he to argue? Paul put his hands on her hips and sped up his pace, smacking against her tight behind and driving his cock into her harder than before. Chani’s slim body was rocked forward as he rutted against her, but as she took it as well as promised. Once again, he should have known better than to doubt her. She not only took it, she seemed to like it. Even when he sped up his thrusting and challenged her as best he could, she just moaned and grunted and told him to keep it going and even speed up and give it to her harder.</p><p>So that’s what Paul did. He stopped worrying about how fast he was going or whether Chani could take it, let go and just focused on enjoying himself. His hips smacked against her again and again as he pushed himself forward and accepted the wonderful offering that she’d made to him. He’d been enjoying the body of his beloved Sihaya for years now, and they’d shared so much together. Now she was sharing this special thing with him and allowing him to fuck the one hole he’d never been inside and never expected to enjoy, and he would make the most of this gift and this new side of the woman who had captured his heart and been by his side since he was only a young man running for his life.</p><p>The young man had become an emperor, and the emperor’s hips slapped against his lover’s ass as he fucked her on the planet that had been his home in his youth. It was a full circle moment for Paul Atreides, but he wasn’t thinking about his youth growing up as Duke Leto’s heir on Caladan anymore. He wasn’t even worried about the upcoming meeting of the Landsraad or the plot against his life either. He was able to shut off his mind and just enjoy <em>feeling</em>. For Paul, who had the concerns of an empire and the Jihad to deal with and the visions and memories of countless lifetimes at the tips of his fingers, simply being able to <em>be </em>and to <em>enjoy </em>was a rare gift.</p><p>He forgot all about any concerns as he gave himself over to his pleasure, and when he got closer to orgasm he followed his body’s urges and only fucked her ass harder. He wanted to get off, he wanted to release inside of her, and his hips snapped against her with ever increasing speed and intensity as he pursued his release. Chani just kept moaning as he did so, encouraging him to use her body to satisfy himself. Paul did not stop until his release hit, and then he pushed his cock as deep inside of her as he could get it, took her perky ass cheeks in both hands and squeezed them as he came inside of her butt. It had been several hours since he’d finished up with Irulan and left the heighliner to return to his childhood home, so he had plenty of semen to pour inside of his lover’s ass.</p><p>Paul was gasping for breath as he came down and finally returned to himself, feeling like he’d just fucked all of the aggravation he might have been feeling about coming events right out of him. His lovers had that impact on him, it seemed.</p><p>He pulled his cock out of Chani’s ass and watched with fascination as some of his cum trickled out of it, offering up visual proof that he’d finally claimed the one hole he’d never touched until this evening.</p><p>“Feeling okay?” he asked as she finally stopped holding herself up on her hands and knees and flopped down onto her belly. She rolled over onto her back and smiled up at him. She looked tired, but she didn’t look like she regretted anything that they’d just done.</p><p>“I’m feeling like we’re going to have to do that again soon,” she said. Paul grinned at that. If this was going to become a more regular part of their sex life, that was something he was all for.</p><p>“You enjoyed it, huh? That’s surprising. Usually that’s more for the man’s benefit,” he said.</p><p>“I enjoyed how wild you got,” she said. “I wouldn’t say that it felt <em>good </em>for me, though I didn’t hate it. But feeling you let go and just <em>fuck </em>me like that? That’s something I’d like to see every now and then.”</p><p>“I’ll show it to you any time you’d like,” he said. He couldn’t think of a better way to relieve the stresses of running an empire, dealing with threats of assassination plots and having a unique insight into human history as well as its future than with a good bit of rough, physical sex, and now it seemed that he would be able to use both Irulan and Chani to that end no matter which of his beautiful lovers shared his bed at the time or which hole he wished to partake in.</p><p>The Bene Tleilax and the Guild were plotting against him and trying to take his life, and he felt sure that he had not seen the last of them. But things were still looking up in Paul’s life.</p><p>--</p><p>If Irulan had thought she was tense and nervous the previous day upon arriving to Paul’s home world and having his mother watching her closely, it was nothing compared to today. They had arrived early so Paul could have a chance to spend a bit of time with his mother who he so seldom saw these days before things got hectic, but now the other representatives of the Landsraad were beginning to set down on Caladan and arrive at the palace. She’d had some fear of how the Lady Jessica would treat her, but at least she’d known they were ultimately on the same side. She could not say the same for those who were now in the process of arriving on Caladan, and she felt her suspicions constantly present as she glanced at each representative when they arrived.</p><p>The Lady Jessica was the first there to greet her guests, as expected, but she and Paul were in a position of prominence as well. They exchanged whispered words and nods after conversing with the first few representatives, but soon a more familiar face arrived.</p><p>“Count Fenring,” Paul said, smiling. “So good to see you.” He was very good at concealing his true emotions when he chose to be so Irulan could not be sure, but her husband seemed to have a genuine respect for the man who had been so close to her father and remained so to this day.</p><p>“Ah-h-h-h-, yes, it is h-mm-m good to see you as well, ah-h-h-h- Emperor Atreides,” Count Fenring said. “And ah-h you as well, Princess mh-h-h Irulan. Your father sends his ah-h regards.”</p><p>“It is good to see you again, Count Fenring,” Irulan said diplomatically. She didn’t know what to say in response to the mention of her father. He was still her father and she did not hate him, not at all. She understood what he did and why, and even knew from her private observations that it had grieved him that it became necessary to move against the Atreides. Her father had always greatly admired Paul’s father Duke Leto, but when the Duke became so well-regarded and the reputation of his forces had grown to the point that he became a threat to his rule, he’d been forced to act. Paul surely understood the reasons behind her father working together with the Harkonnens as well, but that didn’t mean he would feel any sympathy towards him. She didn’t want to offend her husband by passing along any sort of affectionate message for Fenring to take back to her father in his forced isolation, so she said nothing.</p><p>Count Fenring had not come alone. His wife Lady Margot was with him, looking as beautiful as ever, and Paul greeted her as well.</p><p>“I was so sorry to hear about the attempt made on your lives,” the Bene Gesserit lady said after the basic introductions had been handled. “I hope we can get to the bottom of this once and for all.”</p><p>“Yes, mm-hhh-h, as do I,” Count Fenring said. Irulan looked back and forth between them both, wondering whether or not they genuinely did wish to see the truth uncovered. There had been nothing to clearly point to any Bene Gesserit involvement in the plot that they’d been able to see, but that didn’t necessarily mean they weren’t involved. That the Tleilaxu were involved was obvious, as was the assistance of someone from the Spacing Guild since Paul had not seen any hint of the attack in his visions, but that didn’t mean it was only those two groups involved in the conspiracy. The Bene Gesserit had wanted Irulan to birth an Atreides heir to salvage their breeding program, and since she was no longer working with them, they could very well be exploring more extreme alternatives.</p><p>“That’s what we’re here for,” Paul said. “I’m glad you both could be here as representatives.” They were here representing Irulan’s father, though Paul did not say it and neither of them brought it up. It seemed that all involved agreed that any further talk of Shaddam was better left unsaid.</p><p>"And we are glad to be here," Lady Margot said. Then her eyes widened and she smiled. "Oh! But we haven't come alone!"</p><p>There was a minute twitching of Paul's hand that Irulan only happened to notice because she'd been looking down at that particular moment, but it told her that he was on edge about the possibility of Count Fenring having a trick prepared. She'd been there at the moment of truth, when her father clearly wanted his friend to dispatch of Paul for good and he had refused. Count Fenring had chosen not to kill Paul then, even though he likely could have done so since Paul both had not grown into the full strength of his manhood yet and had been fatigued, having come straight off of a fight to the death with Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen. He had instead stayed his hand, earning a smack across the face from her father in the process, and had followed Shaddam into exile on Salusa Secundus. But who was to say that he might not feel differently now, having seen what Paul's rule had been like so far with his Fremen legions spreading across the universe?</p><p>"Come on out, now! Don't be shy; Emperor Paul won't bite!" Lady Margot said, reaching behind her body for some reason.</p><p>A young girl stepped out from behind her, smiling shyly. Irulan couldn't tell if her shy demeanor was genuine or if she was merely playing a part, but either way she could tell that Paul relaxed when he saw her. A girl this young could pose no threat to him.</p><p>"This is our daughter Marie," Lady Margot said. That she was Lady Margot's daughter seemed readily obvious. She had her mother's blonde hair and facial structure, and it was easy to imagine that Margot herself had looked much like this when she'd been a young girl. Her pale blue eyes, however, belonged to neither Margot or Count Fenring.</p><p>"Hello, Marie," Irulan said politely. The girl nodded shyly at her, and then at Paul as he looked at her.</p><p>"We've brought others as well," Lady Margot said. "I think you may be interested in speaking with them more closely, Princess Irulan."</p><p>She pointed a little ways behind her, and Irulan gasped in delight when she saw her two younger sisters, 18 year old Josifa and 16 year old Rugi. It had been far too long since she'd seen them, and unlike when Wensicia had shown up in Arrakeen she was actually happy to see them. They saw her looking at them and waved at her.</p><p>"Go and catch up with your sisters," Paul said. She looked at him and saw him smile and nod.</p><p>"Are you sure?" she asked. She wanted to help him, but she couldn't deny wanting to catch up with her sisters as well.</p><p>"I'm sure," he said. "I'll be fine here. I'm sure that Count Fenring and I can pass the time well enough while you go and see your family."</p><p>"Ah-h-h-hhh, too right," Fenring said as Irulan left their side. If Paul didn't mind, she wasn't going to question it. Things had improved drastically between the two of them and even her and Chani recently, but that didn't make her miss her youngest sisters any less. She hurried over to greet them, and Rugi hugged her quickly.</p><p>"Rugi! It's so good to see you!" Irulan exclaimed, holding her tightly.</p><p>"It's good to see you too, sister," Rugi said. Irulan gave her one last squeeze before letting go.</p><p>"And look at you, Josifa," Irulan said, grinning at her 18 year old sister. "You're all grown up now. The boys can't get enough of you, I'll bet." Her sister (both of them, actually) had inherited the same blessed genes that Irulan had. They were both blonde and stunningly beautiful, and Irulan couldn't have been prouder.</p><p>"If I ever meet a worthwhile one, I'll let you know," Josifa said sourly. Her eyes flicked up to Irulan's head. "I like your hat."</p><p>"Thank you." She'd gone for a different and slightly less flashy hat today as opposed to the one which had drawn a comment from Paul the day before. This was a somewhat more formal occasion with lots of people coming in from offworld (and important people at that), so going with something a little more conventional seemed appropriate. "Are you two hungry or thirsty at all? There's a spot not far from here."</p><p>"I could go for a drink," Rugi said.</p><p>"Follow me," Irulan offered, leading them to the left, past where some of the others who had just arrived were chatting and into a large, sprawling courtyard. Drinks were being served quickly, and Rugi held up her hand to ask for a water.</p><p>"Most have dismissed time travel as mere nonsense, of course, but they are foolishly mistaken!" a male voice said from up ahead, catching Irulan's interest. <em>Time </em>travel, of all things. A few people voiced the disbelief that Irulan shared, but the man was seemingly undeterred. </p><p>"Doubt me if you like, but the truth is right in front of you if you only choose not to look away!" the man said, and he sounded rather pompous in Irulan's opinion.</p><p>"He sounds like an idiot," Josifa said. Irulan nodded, but continued to look in that direction, fascinated despite the apparent absurdity of what was being said.</p><p>"It looks like a lot of people are interested in what he's saying though," Rugi said. She was right. A rather large crowd had gathered over in that direction. She could only guess that they were as unable to turn away as she was.</p><p>"I'd like a closer look," Irulan said. She approached, ignoring the merchants who had gathered in the courtyard  to try and sell their wares to the wealthy nobles in attendance, and got close enough to see the three people standing in the center of the crowd. There was a tall man, who had to be the speaker going on about time travel, and next to him were a brunette who looked athletic and strong underneath the dress she was wearing and a short black haired woman in a blue hat who smiled despite some of the derisive comments coming from the crowd.</p><p>“The consequences of the butterfly effect should one travel into the past are undeniable, yes, but that’s no reason to stop!” the man went on. “It is the joy--nay, it is the solemn <em>responsibility </em>for any who dares call themselves a man of science to plunge boldly into the future. Or the past, as it may be.”</p><p>Irulan walked closer, working her way through the crowd so she could speak to the man directly. She knew she probably shouldn’t engage with someone with such crazy ideas, but she couldn’t help herself. Besides, if this man was <em>here</em>, he had to hold a position of some importance or at least know someone who could arrange for him to be there. An abnormality like this deserved to be investigated, didn’t it?</p><p>“According to Norma Cenva, traveling into the past at all is impossible,” Irulan said. “So obviously there’s no need to worry about changing it if we can’t even travel back into it.”</p><p>There were several murmurs of agreement from the crowd, but this did not seem to deter the man in the slightest. He just shook his head and smiled.</p><p>“Ah, a common belief, to be sure,” he said. “But the ancients believed many things that turned out to be mistaken, such as the idea that man could not travel to planets near-instantaneously. We know how that one turned out, don’t we? It was proven false when mankind discovered how to fold space.”</p><p>His smile widened and he seemed to get excited the further he got into his wild explanation. He must really like to hear himself talk, she decided. She did not pity either of the women with him who were obviously his companions if they had to spend any length of time in his presence listening to him ramble. And speaking of listening to him ramble, he was not done yet.</p><p>“Furthermore, one only has to look at previous research to predict how changing the past changes the future as well. For example, look at Jon Tit—<em>guh</em>!”</p><p>The man stopped speaking abruptly, but it was not for no reason. Irulan wasn’t sure how many others in the crowd caught it, but she did not miss the brunette woman ‘s leg treading on his foot from under her skirts in an obvious attempt to shut him up. She also gave him a rather nasty look for a brief second, as if he was about to reveal something he should not. That was bizarre. Did these women actually believe the wild and rambling theories he was spouting? Perhaps that was why they were with him to begin with.</p><p>“You’re intriguing, sir,” Irulan said. She decided to fish for more information on him. “I don’t believe I caught your name.”</p><p>This appeared to be the worst thing she could have possibly asked him, at least for her eardrums (and for her opinion on his sanity, when it came right down to it.) He burst into a maniacal laughter that had her looking even more strangely at him than she already had been. His companions didn’t seem surprised though. The black-haired one just kept smiling, while the brunette who had stepped on his foot to shut him up sighed.</p><p>“Ah, you must have arrived late, fair lass!” he said. “Pardon my manners and allow me to introduce myself. I am none other than Hououin Kyouma!”</p><p>He spread his arms and smiled as if this was supposed to mean something, which of course it didn’t, at least not to her. She just stared at him blankly for a moment before looking to his two companions to see if they could help her make any sense of this. The brunette rolled her eyes and sighed again, so she didn’t seem like she would be any help. When Irulan made eye contact with the other woman, she chuckled.</p><p>“His name is actually Rintaro Okabe,” she said, which earned an outraged huff from the man. “And I’m Mayuri, and that’s Suzuha,” she said, pointing at the brunette, who just shrugged and smiled helplessly.</p><p>“I, uh, I see,” Irulan said. “And what brings the three of you to Caladan?” She didn’t recognize any of their names, so it would be wise to find out who they were with, and why.</p><p>“Those two are my companions,” the man whose name was apparently Rintaro even if he didn’t introduce himself as such declared. “As for me, I am a researcher from Richese, and I am part of House Richese’s delegation, here to—“</p><p>“What’s all the commotion over here, Irulan?” Paul asked, sounding rather cheerful as he walked towards her. She looked over her shoulder to see her husband approaching, with Count Fenring at his side. She shrugged, not having any clue how to explain this strange man or his strange ramblings.</p><p>Paul looked at Rintaro, and Irulan was very glad she’d been looking at her husband’s face when he did so. For the briefest of windows, he was taken aback. It was only for the flicker of a millisecond, and she wouldn’t have seen it without her Bene Gesserit training, but there was a look of shock on Paul’s face. It was not an emotion she was used to seeing from her husband who knew so much, and seeing it now made her even more curious about this strange man. Why would Paul be looking at him like that before he’d even heard him speak and ramble about his time travel nonsense?    </p><p>“I’m sorry, I don’t believe we’ve met,” Paul said, smiling at Rintaro pleasantly. Irulan didn’t know if anyone else other than her had noticed Paul’s immediate reaction, because he looked and sounded completely composed now after that briefest of flickers. “May I have your name?” It looked like Rintaro was about to laugh and give himself the grand sort of introduction that he had earlier, so Irulan decided to answer for him.</p><p>“This is Rintaro Okabe, a researcher from Richese, and he is—“</p><p>Irulan was distracted by some mumbling from the crowd behind her. The mood felt like it was changing abruptly, and suddenly the bizarre man and his time traveling delusions didn’t seem important anymore. She turned in the direction that she saw heads shifting, and saw a Bene Tleilax man approaching their group, with a retinue of his own behind him. His face was not familiar to Irulan, but one look at Paul had her convinced that he not only knew who the man was but considered him someone to keep his eye on. It didn't show on his face; he was too well-trained and too good at controlling himself for that. But it was there all the same. She felt it, even if she doubted anyone else could, including the man himself.</p><p> </p><p>"Hello, sire," the man said when he saw Paul. "It is so good to see you again."</p><p>"Likewise," Paul said simply. His face wore an easy smile and he sounded perfectly courteous, but there was a curt coldness that Irulan could sense even if she happened to be the only one. When the newcomer turned his head to smile at Irulan, she prepared to follow Paul's lead and not let any show of emotion display no matter who this man was.</p><p>She also felt her own sense of wrongness when she looked at this man. There was something foul about him, something <em>wrong</em>. It reminded her of the faint feeling she'd picked up from the Face Dancer who had taken on the identity of Ayda, Imam's daughter, in order to try and assassinate both her and Paul. Now that she had that experience to compare it to, she had a much better idea of what to expect. She had to resist clenching her fists or settling into an automatic defense stance. Paul was still standing casually, and if he did not consider this creature an imminent threat she would trust in his judgment.  </p><p>"I regret that we did not have the chance to meet when I visited Arrakeen recently, but I am thrilled to be able to do so now," the man said politely. "Princess Irulan, it is a pleasure to meet you. I am Scytale, and I am here representing the Bene Tleilax." Having felt that sense of wrongness from him, and with Paul of course having informed both her and Chani of everything that had happened in his meeting with the Tleilaxu 'ambassador', she wasn't very surprised when he gave his name. Of course this was the same Face Dancer who had met with Paul back in the palace to bring the head of the alleged rogue Tleilax master. He'd indicated he would see Paul again here on Caladan for this meeting of the Landsraad, and had even promised to present him with his second 'gift.'</p><p>"The pleasure is mine, I am sure," she said, smiling serenely. She wanted to do nothing to draw any attention to herself. This man (or this creature, to be more accurate; Face Dancers were neither male or female inherently, though they could take on the physical sex of whoever they were copying) was here for Paul, and that was where their focus was. While they dealt with Paul, Irulan would try to keep her eye on the Face Dancer for anything that might be useful, or watch for any subtle machinations or plots that the Tleilax might have in store while Paul's attention was diverted. Chani wasn't with them at the moment, so it fell to Irulan to look out for their man for both their sakes.</p><p>"Oh, I doubt my humble presence will rank very highly on your list of memories from this trip, princess," the Face Dancer said. She just smiled, and he turned to look at Paul again. "But you, sire, I hope to leave a bigger impression on. As you might recall, I promised I would present your second gift to you when we met here on Caladan."</p><p>"I do recall, and I have been eagerly awaiting it, though I still think you are being far too generous," Paul said. Scytale laughed.</p><p>"After your unfortunate ordeal, it is the very least that I can do for you, sire," the Tleilax said. "And I am pleased to say that you will not be kept waiting any longer, because I am ready to present my gift to you now."</p><p>Scytale made a hand motion to the retinue that had followed behind him, and  the group parted. A lone man walked through the group, and since he didn't seem to be carrying anything, Irulan could only assume that the man himself was intended to be the gift. How peculiar.</p><p>The man drew closer, and Irulan recognized him right away. She had never met this man in person, and until today she'd had very good reason to believe that she never would. The man was dead, after all, or at least that's what she had been told.</p><p>Irulan had never met him, but she had no problem recognizing the features of the swordmaster who had trained Paul in the art of war. That swordmaster, that loyal servant of House Atreides had given his life to help Paul and the Lady Jessica escape when the Sardaukar troops sent by Irulan's father nearly had them, but he stood before them now even so.</p><p>Scytale's gift to Paul was Duncan Idaho.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Poisoned Gifts</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Scytale’s ‘gift’ to Paul is an obvious trap, but will he have the heart to send the ghola away?</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>"And what is your name, ghola?" Paul asked.</p><p>"Sire, his name is--"Scytale began, but Paul talked right over the Face Dancer.</p><p>"With respect, Scytale, I did not ask you," Paul said. "I asked the ghola to tell me his name."</p><p>"Of course," Scytale said smoothly, allowing the rebuke to wash over him. "My apologies sire."</p><p>"My name is Hayt, my Lord," said the Duncan Idaho ghola. Paul merely nodded, ignoring the murmurs from his closest confidants who sat around him in the room across from the ghola and the Face Dancer who had presented him as a gift not less than thirty minutes earlier. There would be time for him to listen to what his trusted confidants had to say about this later, but right now it would be foolish to reveal their true thoughts with Scytale still present.</p><p>"And what is your purpose here, Hayt?" Paul asked.</p><p>"I have been given to you to serve however you dictate, my Lord," the ghola answered. "So long as it is within my capabilities, I will perform whatever tasks you wish."</p><p>"I see." Paul nodded and turned his attention to Scytale. "Scytale, might I ask how you managed to procure this 'Hayt'?"</p><p>"It would be my greatest pleasure to answer, sire," the Face Dancer said. "I am sure I don't need to tell you what befell the honorable Duncan Idaho."</p><p>"You do not," Paul said mildly. He would not soon forget his old swordmaster's sacrifice. He and his mother would have been killed by the Sardaukar before they'd ever reached Stilgar's people and he'd gained the support of the Fremen. Idaho had paid for their freedom with his life.</p><p>"After Idaho's demise, the Sardaukar forces sold his body to the Tleilaxu," Scytale explained. "He was then re-grown in the Axlotl tanks, and the being known as Duncan Idaho became the ghola Hayt. The ghola Hayt, in turn, became a gift worthy of an Emperor. We truly hope that you will appreciate this gift."</p><p>"And were you always planning on gifting him to me?" Paul asked. "Or did you only decide to do so after that rogue Tleilax master attempted to assassinate me in Sietch Ashar?"</p><p>"He was always intended as a gift for you, sire," Scytale assured him, "though I will admit that the unfortunate events in Sietch Ashar hastened events. The hope was to train the ghola as a mentat and a Zensunni philosopher, so he could better serve your needs, but what happened in Sietch Ashar pushed events forward and we decided to present you with our gift earlier than we had intended."</p><p>"That seems reasonable enough," Paul said. He redirected his attention to the ghola. "Do you have any memories of your previous life, Hayt? Do you remember anything of the life your flesh lived as Duncan Idaho?"</p><p>"There are certain things I've come across that feel familiar to me, my Lord," Hayt said. "Your voice and your face, for instance, or the feel of a sword in my hand or the flavor of a certain food. But I have no specific memories to recall despite those feelings."</p><p>"That you can even feel those familiarities is unexpected," Irulan said, speaking up for the first time. "There is no record of any ghola ever managing to remember anything about their previous lives." She didn't come right out and say it, and she kept her voice informative rather than letting her suspicion shine through, but Paul could still sense that it was there. She was as suspicious of the ghola as Stilgar obviously was.</p><p>"Advancements are constant," Scytale said. "This is most unusual, to be sure, but perhaps it will soon become the norm. And perhaps, some day in the future, gholas will retain the full memories from their previous lives."</p><p>"That would be very interesting," Irulan said. Paul couldn't be sure if Scytale, or anyone else in the room aside from him for that matter, picked up on her skepticism. She did not believe a word that the Face Dancer was saying, and Paul couldn't exactly blame her for that. But he would set that aside for now.</p><p>"What would you prefer to be called?" he said, addressing the ghola. "Would you like to keep the name you have been given, or return to the name Duncan Idaho? Or perhaps you'd like a new name?"</p><p>"My Lord may call me whatever he wishes," the ghola answered. "It is of no consequence to me."</p><p>"Then I see no reason to change it," Paul said. "Let your Tleilaxu name stand. Hayt- there's a name which inspires caution." He noticed Scytale smiling oddly, and turned his attention back to the face dancer. "Thank you for the gift, Scytale."</p><p>"But of course, sire! It is my greatest pleasure to present him to you!" Scytale exclaimed.</p><p>"I wonder if you would mind departing, so my council and I may question Hayt alone?" Paul asked. The face dancer shook his head quickly and already began to rise out of his chair.</p><p>"Of course not! I will take my leave, sire." He bowed his head respectfully and then walked out of the room. If he noticed Stilgar's suspicious glare as he walked by, he did not react to it in a way that Paul could see.</p><p>Paul watched the face dancer leave, waited for a moment and then nodded at the ghola. "So, Hayt, for what purpose do you believe the Tleilaxu have gifted you to me?"</p><p>"I believe I have been sent to destroy you," the ghola said without hesitation or emotion. Paul nodded, not allowing his face to reveal anything, but the words still struck him. It wasn't so much the idea itself that affected him; he'd known heading in that whatever gift the Tleilax presented him with would almost surely be used against him in some way. They'd tried to kill him once, and he would be very surprised if they stopped there. It was more the ghola's candor that shook him, though he successfully hid this from everyone else.</p><p> The others in his group were not so successful. He noticed Stilgar tense up, and Chani seemed like she might like to strike the ghola down as well. Alia looked like she didn't know what to think and was struggling to comprehend the presence of this Duncan Idaho ghola, which wasn't such a surprise since she carried all of their mother's memories of Idaho. Even though the real Idaho had been killed before Alia was even born, his sister would still feel as if she knew their family's former swordmaster quite well. Irulan seemed mildly surprised and more than a little suspicious, but hid her response better than everyone else aside from him.</p><p>"I see," Paul said finally. "Do you have any specific reason for believing so, or an idea of how exactly you might destroy me?" He sincerely doubted that he would get anything useful here, but it couldn't hurt to ask.</p><p>"No, my Lord," Hayt said. "I do not know how I might be used. I only have my own suspicions." Chani sighed, but Paul just nodded. He hadn't expected the Tleilaxu to be sloppy enough to leave that kind of information freely accessible to the ghola unless they'd also trained it not to reveal anything to him, so it was no surprise to him that Hayt hadn't been able to tell them anything. It was a bigger surprise that the ghola had been that candid to begin with.</p><p>"And how would you advise me to handle this?" Paul asked him. "What should I do with you, and how should I protect myself from whatever your masters have planned?"</p><p>"You are my master now, or at least you will be if you accept me as a gift," Hayt said. "But I would advise you to refuse. I know not how I might be used against you, so I can give you no advice on steps you could take to protect yourself. The best way for you to protect yourself is to send me away." Several of his confidants nodded in agreement, Stilgar most of all.</p><p>"Thank you for your honest counsel, Hayt," Paul said. "Please leave so my council and I might discuss this amongst ourselves."</p><p>"At once, my Lord," Hayt said. The ghola got up and left the room, and once it was gone Paul looked around the room to see how everyone was feeling.</p><p>"Well?" he asked. "What do you think should be done with the ghola?" His eyes sought out Alia first, and he noticed her chewing on her lower lip.</p><p>"I don't know," she said, shaking her head in confusion. "Logic suggests that sending it away is the obvious choice, and yet that feels...<em>wrong </em>somehow. I don't know what should be done." She seemed lost in her own head, warring between logic and curiosity.</p><p>"I know what should be done," Stilgar said decisively. "Is there any question? You must refuse this poisoned gift before its venom sinks into you. Listen to its own advice and send this creature away." Paul wasn't the least bit surprised to hear this advice from Stilgar.</p><p>"Practical as always, Stilgar," he said. "That would be the safest thing to do, of course. But there are other factors to consider. House Atreides owes Duncan Idaho a great debt. Without him, I would have been dead before we ever had the chance to meet."</p><p>"I don't deny it," Stilgar said. "But that thing is not Duncan Idaho. Duncan Idaho is dead. That is a Tleilax creature, and it should be destroyed. If you do not have the heart to do it, I will do it for you and take its water for the tribe."</p><p>"I believe this ghola <em>is </em>Idaho," Gurney Halleck said. Gurney, who had known Idaho longer than any of them, had been oddly quiet and deep in thought until now. "He has more than just the face. He has the same countenance, the same posture, and he acts as if he knows you. That's no ordinary ghola. More of Idaho lives on in that creature than in any ghola I've ever heard of."</p><p>"You are letting your emotions get the better of you," Stilgar said. "You wish to see your old friend returned from the dead, and so that is what you let yourself see. The creature itself said that it is here to destroy Muad'Dib!"</p><p>"Yes it did," Gurney conceded. "We all realize that the Tleilaxu have ill intent in sending that 'gift' to Paul. But I believe they have created more than they intended to here. No ghola should be able to remember as much as he does, and I don't think they would have allowed him to give you that warning intentionally."</p><p>"So you think Duncan's still in there, Gurney?" Paul asked.</p><p>"I do," the minstrel said, nodding despite Stilgar's grunt. "I think he can be restored." Paul wondered whether Gurney might actually be on to something here, or if Stilgar was right and he was letting his heart overrule his brain.</p><p>"This is foolishness," Stilgar said, making his thoughts clear.</p><p>"Idaho was as much a friend to you as he was to me," Gurney said. "Would you really have him killed?"</p><p>The disagreement continued, and Paul was torn. Logically he believed that Stilgar was right in believing that refusing the gift was the rational decision. The ghola was certainly a trap; no one disputed that. But he also knew that he wasn't going to be able to bring himself to refuse; not with the debt he owed to Duncan Idaho. The Tleilaxu had chosen their weapon well.</p><p>"I will deal with the ghola," he informed his council. Several of them looked like they wanted to object, Stilgar most of all, but Paul dismissed them all with a nod. He didn’t fail to notice Irulan frowning and then glancing over at Chani, but he did not react to it.</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan was beyond relieved when the first Landsraad meeting on Caladan finally ended. It had lasted for hours and yet absolutely nothing of consequence had been discussed. The majority of the meeting had consisted of a long and tedious trade dispute between House Richese and Ix. The dispute had been going on for years with no end in sight, and nothing had been settled today either. She doubted even the parties involved had expected any sort of resolution, but that hadn’t stopped both sides from vehemently arguing their positions. Irulan had sat silently, and she’d been trained too well to let her boredom show, but as soon as they’d been released she’d left the chamber hall as quickly as her manners would allow her to get away with.</p><p>She noticed Paul watching her curiously as she left. They hadn’t had a chance to talk in private about the Duncan Idaho ghola he’d been presented as a gift earlier that day, and he might have been expecting her to talk to him about that now. It wasn’t that she didn’t have strong opinions on that or that she didn’t want to share them with him, but she wanted to go and check in with someone else before she did so.</p><p>She walked through the halls until she reached the quarters she was looking for. The attendants waiting outside looked surprised to see her there, but they did not impede her progress. They stepped aside and allowed her to knock on the door.</p><p>“Chani, are you in?” she asked. “It’s Irulan. I was wondering if I could speak with you.”</p><p>“Of course,” Chani’s voice called from behind the door. “Come in.”</p><p>Irulan opened the door to Chani’s chambers and stepped inside. Paul’s Fremen concubine was lounging on a comfortable-looking chair, and looked up as she approached.</p><p>“Welcome, Irulan,” she said. “Did anything interesting happen at the meeting?”</p><p>Irulan nearly let out an unladylike snort. “Absolutely nothing,” she said, shaking her head. “Just meaningless disputes that will never be solved. You didn’t miss anything, trust me.”</p><p>“Paul strongly suggested that would be the case,” Chani mused. “I guess I’m lucky I wasn’t invited.” Irulan smiled; she wouldn’t disagree with that. “So if you didn’t come to talk about the meeting, what brings you here?”</p><p>“I came to see you because I was watching you when we were talking to Scytale and his <em>gift</em>,” Irulan said. “And based on what I saw, I’m pretty sure you are just as suspicious of the ghola as I am.”</p><p>“Absolutely,” Chani said right away, and she didn’t bother to hide her distaste. “I believe Stilgar has the right of it, though I don’t think Paul would ever be able to bring himself to have the ghola killed.”</p><p>“You may be right about that,” Irulan said. “We might have to settle for just having him send the ghola away.” Chani nodded. “That’s why I wanted to talk to you. I was hoping you would speak to him about this and try to make him see reason.”</p><p>“Why me?” Chani asked. “He respects your opinion. Why not ask him yourself?”</p><p>Irulan shook her head. “I could try, but I think he’s far more likely to listen to you.” She wasn’t kidding herself about her place in Paul’s life. Things had improved between them, but Chani was still at the center and always would be.</p><p>“I can try,” Chani said. “I don’t think it will work, and I don’t think he’ll listen to me on this, but I will do my best.”</p><p>“Thank you. That’s all I can ask,” Irulan said.</p><p>“I do think you should talk to him about this yourself as well,” Chani said. “I think he will expect my argument, and treat it much as he might from Stilgar. But given how strongly you feel about this, I think you might have a chance at breaking through to him and making him see it your way.”</p><p>“I have my doubts,” Irulan said. “I guess I can try though.”</p><p>Chani took a moment to respond, and as she stared off into the distance at nothing Irulan assumed that she was piecing together an idea. “Maybe we can get more information on the plot from Scytale,” she said eventually.</p><p>“How would we do that?” Irulan asked. “He has to know that Paul suspects a plot. I can’t imagine him giving anything away, to Paul or to anyone close to him.”</p><p>“With almost anyone else, I would agree,” Chani said. “But this could be something that you and you alone might be able to accomplish. If there’s anyone close to Paul who might be able to get some information out of Scytale, it is you.”</p><p>“Me?” Irulan didn’t try to contain her surprise about that. “What makes you think Scytale would say anything to me? I’m Paul’s wife.”</p><p>“Yes, but what if you were to try and convince him that because Paul still won’t agree to let you give him an heir even though he’s started sleeping with you, you’ve had enough and want in on their plot?” Chani suggested. “I of course would be there to speak up for you and explain your true intentions if anything that might implicate you came out as a result and got back to Paul.”</p><p>Irulan opened her mouth to dismiss the idea out of hand; she’d already broken off from the Bene Gesserit and stopped doing their bidding, after all. But when she gave Chani’s suggestion a bit more consideration, she realized that the plan wasn’t without merit. If things hadn’t changed between her and Paul, she might very well have been someone they reached out to about participating in the plot.</p><p>“I think that such a ploy would be unlikely to work on Scytale,” Irulan said eventually, after giving the idea some more thought. “But I will speak to Paul the next time I’m alone with him.”</p><p>Their conversation continued for a bit, but Irulan was somewhat distracted by another thought that Chani’s suggestion had put in her head. The comment about Paul still not giving her an heir made her wonder whether he was actually still putting the contraceptives in her food and drink as he said he was. She didn’t see why he would lie to her about that, but she’d actually missed her period. Previously she’d dismissed it as a side-effect of the contraceptives, or perhaps it had even just been caused by the stress the plot and the threat to Paul’s wellbeing was putting on her, but Chani’s comment made her wonder.</p><p>“Do you know who Paul plans on sleeping with tonight?” Irulan asked eventually. If it was her, maybe she would take that chance to talk with him.</p><p>“No, he hasn’t said anything to me,” Chani said. “But I would assume it’ll be you, since he slept with me last night.”</p><p>“Right,” Irulan said. They didn’t have a set schedule, but he did seem to alternate between the two of them pretty consistently now that she thought about it. “If it’s me, I’ll talk to him.” She turned towards the door, but before she could leave Chani spoke up.</p><p>“Why did you come to me about this, rather than Jessica?” Chani asked. “Not that I’m complaining. I’m just curious.”</p><p>“No one has my confidence on this as much as you do,” Irulan said. “I don’t doubt that Lady Jessica would never plot against her son, but she does rule here in Caladan, and she hasn’t been back to Arrakis in years. She has other priorities, but there is nothing in your life more important to you than Paul.” Chani smiled and nodded, and Irulan decided to be even more forthcoming with her. “You’re also the only person I dealt with on Arrakis who never disrespected me in any way.”</p><p>Chani had never been as good at hiding her emotions as Paul or Irulan herself, and a lot of the time she didn’t even try. She seemed genuinely touched by Irulan’s words, and she smiled at her and unexpectedly leaned in to kiss her on the cheek. Irulan was so surprised that a blush broke out on her cheeks despite her Bene Gesserit training, and the sight of it made Chani laugh.</p><p>Irulan felt surprisingly flustered as she finally took her leave, but she managed to recover quickly enough that she knew none of Chani’s attendants would suspect a thing. She did her best to put that little moment behind her and focus on what she might say to her husband the next time they were alone.</p><p>--</p><p>Personal relaxation and private time would have to wait, because when a bunch of nobles of the Landsraad gathered there were all sorts of formal functions and meetings they were expected to attend. And as the wife of the Emperor who also happened to be the son of the Lady Jessica, Irulan was not only obligated to have dinner in the grand dining hall, she was seated at the high table. She had been seated between Paul and Count Fenring, who seemed to get along quite well considering how closely the count was aligned with Irulan’s father.</p><p>“I ahh-hm-mm- I am curious why the conference is not being held ah-hmm-mm at Castle Caladan,” the count said. Paul swallowed his mouthful of water before replying.</p><p>“My mother doesn’t reside in the castle itself very often these days,” Paul said. “Too many memories, I think.”</p><p>The count said nothing in response to that, and Irulan frowned. Obviously he was referring to memories of the life the Lady Jessica had lived with her son and her late lover the Duke Leto before Emperor Shaddam, Irulan’s father, had taken Caladan away from them and assigned them to the desert planet known as Dune instead. They all knew how that had ended.</p><p>“I’m curious about something as well, Count Fenring,” Paul said.</p><p>“Oh-hh-mmm?” Fenring said. “What—hmmm—mm—might that be?”</p><p>“You were there today when Scytale presented me with the ghola known as Hayt,” Paul said. Irulan’s eyes immediately went to the Idaho ghola, who was also at the high table and seated next to his (or make that Idaho’s, rather) old friend Gurney Halleck. Halleck was quite drunk and was singing a rowdy-sounding song while playing his baliset. Irulan frowned, wondering if Gurney had completely let his guard down around the ghola already even after its blunt assessment of why it had been presented as a gift to Paul.</p><p>“Ahh-hmm-mmm, yes, I was,” Fenring said.</p><p>“I’m curious whether you, given your closeness to former Emperor Shaddam, knew anything about the Sardaukar selling Duncan Idaho’s body to the Tleilaxu,” Paul asked.</p><p>“No, I ah-hmm did not,” Fenring answered. Irulan looked at her father’s old friend thoughtfully. She wasn’t so sure he was telling the truth about that, though she could not conclusively say that he was lying.</p><p>“I see,” Paul said mildly, and Irulan couldn’t pick up anything on how he was taking Fenring’s denial. “So long as we’re asking questions, how are you enjoying your retirement on Salusa Secundus? Are you growing bored with your isolation?”</p><p>“Ohh—hmmm—mm-mmm, no, I am rather ah-mm-mmm-hmm enjoying retirement, actually,” Count Fenring said. “It’s been ahmm-mm nice not having to worry about having to ah—mmm—keep House Corrino in power any longer.”</p><p>Irulan was surprised at this line of questioning from Paul, and very curious about what game he was playing with Count Fenring here. But when she noticed Hayt leaving the high table, she decided to follow him. Let Paul continue playing whatever game he was playing with her father’s old friend; she was going to take it upon herself to keep an eye on the ghola and perhaps learn something of value.</p><p>“Please excuse me,” she said, looking at Paul. He nodded, and she could feel his eyes on her as she got up from the table. Then Count Fenring began to say something else, and Irulan went on her way. She could see the ghola walking out onto a balcony that overlooked the beautiful sea, and she followed him out.      </p><p> "Caladan is beautiful, isn't it?" she asked when she stepped outside. It was just the two of them out there, which was just what she needed.</p><p>"It is," the ghola said simply. He did not look back at her, but just stared out over the sea.</p><p>"Does seeing it bring back any memories?" she asked. "Of the life you lived when you were the human known as Duncan Idaho, I mean."</p><p>"No," he said tonelessly. "It evokes a certain feeling of familiarity, but there are no specific memories."</p><p>"That must be frustrating," she said. "To feel that you ought to know something, but be unable to recall it."</p><p>"Frustrating?" he responded, and for the first time he turned his head back to look at her. "Is it? I'm not sure. Am I supposed to feel frustration that I don't possess the memories of Duncan Idaho?"</p><p>"I would," she said. "I wouldn't know what to do with myself if I woke up one day and could no longer remember anything that I'd done as Irulan."</p><p>"But if you woke up as a ghola, as I did, you would no longer be Irulan," he answered. "And whatever this flesh has seen, I am not the man named Duncan Idaho. I am the ghola called Hayt."</p><p>"Ah." She wondered how Gurney would have reacted if he'd heard that. Would he have given up? She doubted it. But now wasn't the time to worry about how much of Duncan Idaho was still in there and whether or not they could bring him back, as Gurney seemed to think they could. She had higher priorities. "And how does the ghola called Hayt think the Tleilaxu will use him to destroy Paul Atreides?"</p><p>"I do not know," he said, shaking his head. "Had I known, I would have given more focused advice instead of simply suggesting that he refuse the gift."</p><p>She nodded. She didn't doubt that he had no conscious knowledge of how he would be used, but she was hoping that a more direct form of questioning might call out some hidden knowledge. "Could they use you to gradually poison Paul's mind?" she asked. "Or maybe they have placed some compulsion on you, and when the right conditions are met you will try to kill him?"</p><p>There was no spark of recognition present on Hayt's face. He merely shrugged. "Both of those scenarios seem like legitimate possibilities," he said. "But as I have stated, I do not know. Whatever the Tleilaxu have planned is unknown to me." Irulan frowned and tried to think of some other way to phrase it, but she was interrupted.</p><p>"What are you doing, Irulan?" Paul asked as he stepped out onto the balcony with them. She sighed, knowing that he was going to put an end to this attempt to get answers from the ghola and she had come no closer and gained no information of use.</p><p>"I will take my leave so you can discuss this in private," Hayt said. Paul just nodded, and stepped aside to allow the ghola to walk back inside. Once he was gone, Irulan's husband stared at her expectantly.</p><p>"I was trying to ascertain how the Tleilaxu plan to use the ghola against you," she said calmly. She saw no reason why she should need to hide her intent.</p><p>"As I already said, the ghola is my business. You shouldn't concern yourself with it," Paul said. He didn't sound angry, but she could tell that he was in no mood to discuss it. He stepped closer to her and put his hand on her back to slowly stroke her skin through her dress. His touch was meant to distract her, and it was working. "The dinner is wrapping up. I will be retiring soon. In an hour's time, I'll visit you in your chambers."</p><p>He planted a kiss on her temple, and Irulan said nothing to stop him as he went back inside. She would welcome him into her chambers; she would enjoy his attention and enjoy having sex with him. And after they were done, she would take Chani's advice and do her best to speak to him about the ghola and make her feelings known. Perhaps he would be more amenable to listening to her after they'd had a nice fuck.</p><p>--</p><p>As promised, Paul arrived at her chamber nearly an hour later on the dot. She was waiting for him on her bed, and she could see as his eyes roved her body and took her in that he appreciated seeing her in the white camisole and underwear that she'd changed into.</p><p>"I have been looking forward to this all day," he said as he crossed the room and joined her on the bed. "The day seemed interminably long."</p><p>"A lot happened today," she agreed as his hands began the process of stripping her out of her underwear.</p><p>"Too much, and yet not enough," he said. "I'm left with more questions than answers." He got her underwear down over her feet, and smiled as he looked between her legs for a few moments. She could feel herself already getting excited for him, and if he'd decided to go straight to fucking her she felt she would have been ready for it pretty quickly. That wasn't what he did though. Instead he brought his hands to her chest and began to grope her breasts. "At least I know what to expect here," he said, sounding far more relaxed now. "I know just what's waiting for me when I visit your chambers."</p><p>He had fun playing with her big breasts, and even with her continued concerns about the ghola and how it would be used against him, Irulan was happy to help him relax. It was nice to know that she could offer him comfort after the stresses and tedium of the day. She also rather enjoyed feeling his hands on her breasts, and moaned as he squeezed them.</p><p>"I'm always here for you," she said. "I'm always ready to help you relax."</p><p>"Then maybe you can help me relax by sucking my cock?" he said. She smiled and immediately wiggled her body down to get his cock out so she could give him what he'd requested. She licked and kissed around his tip until he got fully erect, which didn't take long at all. Once he was ready she took him into her mouth and began to suck.</p><p>Irulan had sucked her husband's cock often enough by now that there were any number of ways she could have gone about this, and a significant variety of techniques that she had mastered and had at her disposal. She could have thrown her head down on his cock and tried to get him off as quickly as possible, and had done so successfully several times. But this didn't feel like the time for an all-out frenzy where she frantically fucked her own face on his cock. This felt like a good time for her to take it slowly and focus on skill over energy.</p><p>She moved her head rather sedately, taking her time in her slow descent. But she still had Paul groaning thanks to the consistent pressure of her lips and her ever-moving tongue, which were busy sucking and licking away no matter how slow her head moved. Paul ran his hands through her hair and smiled down at her as she sucked his cock, and Irulan felt deeply content at how well she could please him.</p><p>She would have been perfectly happy to suck his cock for the rest of the night, but even this slower pace was inevitably going to make him cum eventually. A low grunt told her that he was close, and while she briefly considered pulling back to keep this going for longer, she decided to push forward and finish him off. After another minute or two of her slow yet extremely effective blowjob, Paul groaned, his cock twitched on her tongue and he began to release into her mouth.</p><p>Irulan kept her lips around him until he was finished cumming, then pulled back and slowly licked him clean. This had the dual purpose of both cleaning him up and more importantly speeding up the process of getting him ready for more, and she stared up at him as she did it to speed things along even more.</p><p>"Feeling better now?" she asked. He chuckled and nodded.</p><p>"I doubt anyone could fail to cheer up and relax after being between your lips," he said. "Your mouth is one of the best ways to relieve stress that I've ever found."</p><p>"And it's all for you," she said. It was true; she'd been trained to be an excellent lover, but just as planned, Paul was the only one she'd ever used those talents on. She was happy that they were working so effectively, but there was still more to go. She wanted to please her husband as much as she possibly could today. That was usually a goal of hers these days anyway, but tonight there was an added importance placed on it. If she wanted to convince him to dismiss Hayt after they were done, she would need to try her very hardest to make this memorable. She had something special that she thought might help her in this goal. She'd been saving it for awhile now, waiting for a special day to use it, and she could think of no better occasion than this.</p><p>Paul watched curiously as she got up off of the bed, and she smiled and made sure to give her hips an exaggerated wiggle, knowing his eyes would follow her swaying ass as she walked over to the drawer where she'd stored a certain surprise. She spun around and held it out in her hand, displaying it to him with a flourish. He smiled when he saw what she was holding.</p><p>"You still have those, huh?" he asked, looking at the handcuffs he'd previously given to her.</p><p>"Of course," she said. "And I can think of no better time to put them to use." She walked back over to the bed slowly and held out the handcuffs for him to take, which he did. Then she turned away from him and held her arms back in an obvious invitation for him to put the cuffs on her. .</p><p>"You're in an interesting mood tonight," he said. She felt the cuffs snap into place quickly, and once they were applied she turned back around to face him.</p><p>"I'm in the mood for you to take me roughly," she said, staring at him seriously. He nodded, and his smile got wider.</p><p>"That's one thing you'll never have to beg me for," he said. He pulled her down onto the bed, moving her so she was on her back and her cuffed hands were extended above her head. There was a feeling of powerlessness here that Irulan hadn't felt for some time, but it didn't worry her. Things were different between them now. Back when this had all started he'd put her in positions like this because he felt like it, and without worrying about what she wanted. Now he was handcuffing her because she'd asked him to, and he was going to fuck her hard because that's what she wanted him to do. It made all the difference in the world to Irulan. Before she'd lamented her lack of control; now she rejoiced in allowing him to use her body like they both wanted him to.</p><p>Her little cleanup job had started the process of getting him excited again, and her wiggling ass had likely continued it. But now, with her hands restrained and her beautiful body naked and spread for him, it took no time at all for him to be rock hard and ready to fuck her. She felt just a few seconds of the head of his cock pressing against the outer lips of her cunt, and then he pushed forward and speared her.</p><p>She'd told Paul that she wanted him to fuck her hard, and he listened. He wasted absolutely no time in getting straight to pounding into her, pulling his hips back and thrusting them forward quickly and with a tremendous amount of force. He had continued to use her roughly quite regularly even after the change and softening of their relationship as well as Chani's return, but it had been some time since he'd fucked her with this much intensity.</p><p>It was something he appeared to be very much in the mood for after the day that he'd had, and she was happy to be the one that he unleashed all of the frustration and confusion on. She was happy to feel his hands on her body, whether they were holding her hips, squeezing her breasts or even coming up to lightly hold her throat. He never fully committed into turning it into an outright choke, but the pressure and the threat was there. He was showing her that he was in control, and having her hands cuffed together only added to that feeling of complete submissiveness.</p><p>Not so long ago this might have frustrated her, but now Irulan was happy about it. She was happy about the way things were going between them, and she was happy to allow him to cuff her hands together and fuck her as hard as he could. There was a world of difference between being put into this position and putting herself there voluntarily, so while she had experienced a sort of reluctant enjoyment when he used to fuck her like this, now she embraced the pleasure wholeheartedly. She moaned with every thrust, and feeling his hands squeeze her breasts possessively or rest on her throat only excited her more. This might not have been exactly what the Bene Gesserit had in mind when they trained her in the arts of seduction and sex, but she was happy with the direction her life had gone now that she'd broken off from the Bene Gesserit and was enjoying her husband's attention.</p><p>Paul was enjoying it at least as much as she was. He'd always taken a great deal of pleasure in fucking her hard, dating back to that first night when he'd claimed her virginity at last, and the excitement had never faded. All of the stresses of the day seemed to drift away as he fucked her as hard as he was able. She could feel it in his thrusts and see it on his face. For at least this little while, he was able to forget about all of his other problems and just enjoy fucking his wife.</p><p>Irulan was pleased to be able to give this to him, but this wasn’t a completely selfless gesture on her part. Aside from her hopes that this might make him more agreeable to listening to her side of things on the ghola, it was also a simple fact that she enjoyed this greatly too. She used to be reluctant to acknowledge how good it felt to have her husband use her roughly, but now she felt free to sit back and enjoy how good all of this felt. When the repeated deep thrusts worked her body up to the point that she felt her orgasm building, she just moaned, let him know how much she wanted this and waited for him to finish the job.</p><p>Irulan’s moans only served to make Paul fuck her that much harder, which was a wonderful thing for both of them. They fed off of each other, Irulan’s moans bringing the best out of Paul and Paul’s harder thrusts increasing her pleasure exponentially. They really did make a good team.</p><p>With how fierce Paul’s thrusts were and how that big cock of his made Irulan’s body sing, it was academic that they were both going to get off soon. The only real question was who would cum first, and how quickly the other would follow. Irulan felt pretty sure that she knew the answer to the first question.</p><p>In what was no surprise at all to her, she got there before he did. She knew that Paul could just listen to her moans and look down at her face and tell that she was just about there, because he smiled down at her and kept his eyes fixed on her face. It was as if he wanted to watch her react to the huge climax he was about to give her.</p><p>If Irulan’s hands had been free she might have clung to his neck or grabbed onto his hair, but they were obviously not going to be grabbing anything right now. She settled for squeezing his waist with her legs and moaning in bliss as the pleasure hit her. Paul kept his eyes on her as she came, but she felt his thrusts get harder and faster than they’d been all night, as if he wanted to catch up to her and cum along with her. If that was his goal, he was successful.</p><p>She was still in the middle of her orgasm when his eyes snapped shut and he began to cum inside of her. It made her moan that much louder. There was something about having him cum inside of her that excited her in ways she couldn’t quite explain, even to herself. Maybe it had something to do with her initial purpose in becoming his wife, which was to have children with him. The thought reminded her of his stated intention to feed her contraceptives so she would not get pregnant no matter how often he fucked her or how many times he came inside of her, and that in turn made her think about her missed period and how it had made her question whether he was actually still following through on that.</p><p>His eyes opened back up as quickly as they’d shut, and he stared at her again through the rest of his orgasm. He kept looking down at her face until the semen stopped flowing and the thrusts slowed down and at last stopped, and when they stopped he kissed her on the lips. She moaned into his mouth; she hadn’t expected this tender gesture at the end of what had been a rough fuck, but it was a pleasant surprise.</p><p>While still kissing her, he reached above her head and unlocked her handcuffs. They fell away and she rubbed her wrists, but he continued to kiss her and she was in no hurry to have him off of her. When he broke away from her lips it was only to plant a series of affectionate kisses on her body. His lips started at her chin and down to her throat, and then they trailed ever downwards, moving between her cleavage and down her belly, past her navel and finally making it all the way to her cunt.</p><p>“I’m very fortunate to have you as a wife, Irulan,” he said, and it made her heart race. “Not only are you incredibly gorgeous, but you like having rough sex just as much as I do.”</p><p>“I can’t deny that,” she said quietly. He wasn’t wrong. She’d come to genuinely enjoy this sort of rough sex, and she no longer even attempted to hide that fact.</p><p>Since he was being so tender with her and was so obviously pleased, she decided she likely would not get a better chance than this to bring up what she wanted to bring up. She still doubted that she would be able to get through to him, but Chani had seemed to think it was worth a try and so she would do her best. She took a deep breath and pushed ahead.</p><p>“Paul, I want to talk to you about the ghola,” she said. He had been planting little kisses on her inner thighs, but the kisses stopped as soon as the words were out of her mouth. He removed his head from between her legs and looked up at her, and she could see that whatever good mood he’d been in after their fuck was already gone thanks to the change in topic.</p><p>“There’s nothing to talk about,” he said firmly. “As I have already said, the Duncan Idaho ghola is my business, and I will deal with it.” He said it in a way that brooked no argument, and he was making it clear that he considered the matter closed. But Irulan couldn’t let it stand there. She shook her head.</p><p>“You obviously know that the Tleilaxu intend to use the ghola as a weapon against you,” she said. He shook his head and smiled, but this was not the satisfied smile he’d had in his face mere moments earlier. This was a smile full of mockery, and it reminded her of how he’d so often looked at her in the time immediately after Chani had left and he’d started fucking her. She did not like to see that look on his face, and seeing it now gave her a bad feeling that this was already slipping away from her.</p><p>“Of course I do,” he said. “I would have to be an utter fool not to see straight through that. I didn’t need the ghola to give me that warning, and I certainly don’t need you to remind me of it. I’m well aware of what they intend, and I will proceed anyway. It is my life, Irulan, and any risks that I take with it are mine to take.”</p><p>“I know you aren’t that simple-minded,” she said. His eyes narrowed, but she didn’t let that stop her. “You’re the Emperor. Your well-being doesn’t affect only you, but everyone around you as well. Any of us who are close to you are also at risk, whether directly or indirectly, and we must speak up when we feel you’re taking needless, foolish risks.”</p><p>“We?” he said, still looking at her through narrowed eyes. “And who is we? You and Stilgar? Are you going to tell me to stick a knife in the ghola and give its water to the tribe next?”</p><p>“I didn’t say that,” she said, feeling her own frustration build. Admittedly she didn’t think that was the worst idea, but asking Paul to destroy a ghola born of the flesh from a man who he respected so much was a step too far. It would be enough to make him accept that this was a risk he need not take and send the ghola away where it could not harm him, and that’s what she would continue to attempt to do. “But it’s not just Stilgar who thinks that keeping the ghola by your side is a mistake. I spoke with Chani earlier, and she shares my concern.”</p><p>“She is welcome to be as concerned as she likes,” Paul said, clearly not moved by the mention that his true love shared the opinion of his wife on this issue. “It is not her decision to make, and she also is not bound by the debts that I am.”</p><p>“And what debts do you think you’re bound by, that you must accept this poisoned gift?” she asked. She was sure that she knew where this was going, but she wanted to hear it straight from him.</p><p>“House Atreides owes Duncan Idaho a great deal,” he said. “I wouldn’t be standing here without him.”</p><p>She shook her head. It was exactly what she’d expected him to say. “That is not Duncan Idaho,” she said, shaking her head. “It may wear the face of Duncan Idaho, but Duncan Idaho is dead.”</p><p>“Yes,” Paul agreed, nodding quickly. “Dead by the hands of your father’s Sardaukar forces,” he said. She winced. He wasn’t wrong, but this was hardly the point. Hadn’t they moved beyond what her father had done to his family years ago? And besides, she’d had no part in any of that, and he knew it. He was bringing it up now just to be spiteful.</p><p>“Yes,” she said, not in the mood to argue over that. “They killed him and sold him to the Tleilaxu, who threw him in their tanks. But what they brought back <em>isn’t </em>Duncan Idaho, no matter what it might say about familiar feelings. You owe a debt to Duncan Idaho, and you would never need to worry about Duncan Idaho betraying you or trying to harm you. But you can’t say the same about the ghola named Hayt, and if you don’t believe me, ask the damned ghola yourself! Didn’t it come right out and tell you not to accept?”</p><p>“And didn’t that strike you as odd?” he countered. “I don’t know if Gurney is right about us being able to truly bring Duncan all the way back, but he <em>is </em>right about Hayt feeling things that no ghola ever has. I’ve never heard of any ghola feeling a connection to old faces and voices from the life it lived as a human. Have you?”</p><p>“I haven’t,” she said with a sigh. She couldn’t deny that.</p><p>“Of course you haven’t,” he said, nodding sharply. “There’s <em>something </em>of Duncan in there, and I’m not going to reject it.”</p><p>“Even if it means risking me, or the Lady Jessica, or Chani, or everyone else you care for?” she snapped. “Will it take seeing all of us dead for you to admit that this is a stupid risk?”</p><p>Paul glared at her now, in a way he hadn’t in at least a month, if ever. She knew that she’d gone too far in her desperation to make him see reason, but she did not regret it. This <em>was </em>a stupid risk, and he needed to realize that. Maybe he wouldn’t listen to her, but at least she could say she’d honestly tried her best to appeal to him.</p><p>“And you count yourself in that group, do you?” he asked. She flinched, and he smirked at her viciously. “You believe that my seeing you harmed would be in any way comparable to seeing Chani harmed, or my mother harmed?”</p><p>“That’s not what I said,” she protested, but he shook his head and talked over her.</p><p>“You seem to believe that what we’re doing means something other than what it actually is,” he said. “I love my mother, yes, even if we don’t see eye to eye on everything. And I love Chani. She’s my heart; my Sihaya. But you?” He looked down at her coldly, and Irulan felt a lump in her throat. “You may be my wife, Irulan, but that doesn’t mean I love you. I love your body, and I love fucking you, but I don’t love you. If you thought this meant otherwise, you were mistaken. I will never care for you in the way that I care for Chani, and you will never, ever have children from me.”</p><p>Irulan felt his words as keenly as she’d felt that face dancer stab her in the side in Sietch Ashar. She’d known she would never replace Chani in his heart, but she’d thought he at least felt <em>something </em>for her. Apparently it had only been her imagination though. She felt despair, but it quickly grew into anger.</p><p>“Since you’ve made your feelings towards me quite clear, I know where we stand,” she said. “But I never should have doubted, given how all of this started. Tell me, do you plan on raping me again the next time you don’t feel like bothering Chani?”</p><p>He glared at her, but he said nothing. What could he say to that, and what was there even left to be said between them at all? He got up, redid his clothing quickly and stormed out of her chambers. She glared at his back as he left, but once he was gone it didn’t take long for the anger to fade and sorrow to take its place</p><p>She sobbed as quietly as she could and shook her head, frustrated at how foolish she’d been to ever think she held any place in Paul’s heart. She couldn’t replace Chani, and she knew that, but did she truly mean <em>nothing </em>to him? The mere idea upset her, and made her feel sick.</p><p>As it turned out, she felt sick in a far more literal sense. She had to rush into the bathroom, and just barely made it in time before she vomited. As she remained down on her knees and heaved, she was reminded once again about her missed period and her unspoken questions about whether Paul was actually still giving her the contraceptives like he’d said.</p><p>Of course he was, she told herself. He’d just gotten through telling her that he would never have children with her, so what reason would there be to think that he would go back on that? But she decided to make absolutely sure.</p><p>Once her heaves died off, she used her Bene Gesserit training to concentrate her psyche on her internal bodily functions, just so she could rule out any possibility of pregnancy being the cause of her missed period or her sudden sickness. But when she searched inside of herself, she discovered something she had not expected to find.</p><p>There was a small heart beating within her womb. As a Bene Gesserit, she knew what it meant. She’d been taught all about this, and intellectually she knew exactly what was happening. That didn’t stop her from shaking her head in denial.</p><p>She was pregnant. She had achieved that which had been her goal when she first agreed to marry Paul Atreides. She was going to have his child. She was going to have a child fathered by the man who had only just left her chambers after telling her in no uncertain terms that he did not love her and never would, and had seemed quite insistent on her never getting pregnant.</p><p>She vomited a second time.  </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Release</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Irulan ponders telling Paul of her pregnancy, and has a very revealing conversation with Chani.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>(See author's notes below for content warning/themes and pairing(s) for this chapter.)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It was the morning after Irulan's argument with Paul and her subsequent discovery, but she still felt every bit as lost as she had then. The vomiting had stopped, at least for the moment, but she was no closer to finding any answers.</p><p>Using her Bene Gesserit abilities on the foetus, she could discern that she was about four weeks pregnant at this stage. This put the timeline for when she'd gotten pregnant at some point prior to her nearly being killed by the Face Dancers at Sietch Ashar.</p><p>That she was pregnant despite Paul having firmly declared just last night that she would never have children from him would have been puzzling enough on its own, since it had given her absolutely no reason to think he'd stopped putting the contraceptives in her food as he had been all along. But the timeline made it even more confusing. Things had changed between them after Sietch Ashar; he'd softened towards her, or so she'd believed until last night at least. But she was absolutely certain that the child had been conceived prior to that, when her role as Paul's 'wife' had still essentially been that of a sex slave. If she'd suspected him of not giving her the contraceptives anymore she would've thought it would have come at some point after Sietch Ashar. So why had she become pregnant before her near-death experience?</p><p>Had Paul been lying from the beginning about putting contraceptives in her food and drink? Or had he been feeding her the contraceptives all along and continued to even now, but made a mistake somewhere along the way? That seemed less likely than anything else, considering he had his oracular sight to rely on, but right now she couldn't rule anything out. She needed answers, but right now wasn't the time to go about seeking them. Obviously she wasn't going to be able to keep this secret indefinitely. It was only a matter of time before everyone learned that she was pregnant, but she'd reached the decision that for now she was not going to inform anyone, including Paul, about her pregnancy.</p><p>There was also the matter of the child's sex. While the average woman had no control over that, it was well within Irulan's capabilities to make that determination herself thanks to her Bene Gesserit training. That had been integral to the generations of the careful Bene Gesserit breeding program, after all, before Paul's mother the Lady Jessica had defied the orders she'd been given for love of her duke and given him a son instead of a daughter. Irulan's own mother had made the opposite choice. The Sisterhood had commanded her to bear Irulan's father only daughters and she had done so, putting the needs of the Bene Gesserit above Shaddam's desire to have sons and continue the Corrino line.</p><p>Irulan wasn't bound by the demands of the Bene Gesserit, but she still had the power to choose. She could ensure that the child growing inside of her was a boy. She could make the heir that the Bene Gesserit had wanted her to produce all along, but more importantly the heir that she'd always hoped for.</p><p>But she wasn't going to do that. Irulan's perspective had shifted, and it wasn't the Bene Gesserit's desires that influenced her thinking anymore. It wasn't even the political ambitions of a daughter who wished to see that Corrino blood still ran through the emperor's veins even if her father had been deposed. Irulan didn't want to be a Bene Gesserit sister or a political schemer to her child. She wanted to be a mother to her child rather than treat it as a tool, so she wasn't going to choose either independence, as Lady Jessica had, or obedience, as Irulan's mother Anirul had. She wasn't going to use her abilities to influence the sex of the child. She would leave it up to chance, and whether it be a son or a daughter she would love her child just the same.</p><p>There was a knock on the door to her chambers, and Irulan took a brief moment to examine herself and make sure she was at least somewhat presentable. "Come in," she called.</p><p>Chani entered, and she looked guilty as she closed the door gently behind her. "Paul told me what happened last night," she said. "I'm sorry. It's my fault. I should have spoken to him about the ghola instead of pushing you to do so."</p><p>"No," Irulan said, shaking her head. "It's most certainly not your fault." It wasn't. Irulan might have spoken with Paul at Chani's urging, but Chani had encouraged her to do so only because she thought she had a better chance of getting through to him. That things had gone the way that they had was in no way Chani's doing.</p><p>"It's nice of you to say so," Chani said, and Irulan could see that the Fremen woman still felt some guilt even if she knew that her intentions had been good. Irulan's words weren't going to convince her, and she realized it would probably be pointless to try. Are you feeling alright?" she asked.</p><p>"I'm fine," Irulan said. "If anything I should thank you, and Paul." Chani looked very surprised to hear that, and Irulan laughed without humor. "It was good that my husband made things clear when he did. He dispelled the illusion that there was any real affection between us before it could take hold of me, and now I know that it was only ever about physical relief for him."</p><p>Chani winced and shook her head. "Everything will be fine eventually," she said. "He's going to feel remorse about the things that he said to you, if he doesn't already. And he didn't mean them; I'm sure of that."</p><p>"I'm not so sure about that," Irulan said. "But regardless of whether he meant them or not, it's very clear that he's not going to budge on the matter of the ghola no matter what either of us says."</p><p>"He just needs more time," Chani insists. "We'll be able to convince him to send the ghola away eventually."</p><p>"We may not have that long," Irulan countered. "We all know that the Tleilaxu gave him that 'present' in an attempt to aid in their plot to destroy him; the ghola itself even said as much. Who knows how soon they might put their plans in motion?"</p><p>"You may be right," Chani conceded. "But if you're concerned with not waiting for Paul and stopping the Tleilaxu before they can bring their plans together, maybe you should consider the other approach I suggested to you the last time we spoke."</p><p>It took Irulan a moment to remember what she was referring to, and when she did she raised an eyebrow at her. "You're talking about me approaching Scytale and pretending as if I want to join their plot against Paul?" Chani nodded. "Why are you so insistent on me approaching Scytale?"</p><p>"If we can't convince Paul to send the ghola away so it can't be used against him, we need to figure out what they're planning so we can stop it," Chani said. "Scytale's the obvious source for us to go to."</p><p>"No, I mean why are you so insistent on <em>me</em>, specifically, approaching him?" Irulan elaborated. "Why does it have to be me?"</p><p>"Because there is no one else close to Paul who Scytale might legitimately believe would turn against him," Chani said. "No other member of his council could do this. It's only you who might be able to earn Scytale's trust and be taken into his confidence."</p><p>If Irulan had been in a better frame of mind she might have understood that Chani meant nothing by it and was only looking for a solution, but as it was Irulan was just annoyed by Chani's logic. Of course Irulan was the only one who might be able to do this, because she was the one he didn't trust or like, or have any use for aside from her body.</p><p>"Is that really what your goal is here?" Irulan asked. Chani just looked confused. "Are you hoping I'll be able to get information from Scytale? Or are you actually planning to lure me into a trap so you can make Paul think I'm helping the Tleilaxu and convince him to dispose of me?"</p><p>Chani's jaw dropped. "What? How could you even say that? Of course that's not what I'm doing!"</p><p>Irulan was unmoved. "You've done a wonderful job of convincing everyone that you're fine with everything," she said. "You've even had me convinced. But surely you can hardly be pleased that you've had to share Paul with me. For five years I was his wife in name only while you held his heart and shared his bed exclusively. I'll never have his heart, but after you came back from your time away suddenly I was in his bed, or he was in mine I suppose. Either way, I'm sure it wasn't exactly fun for you to have to share him with someone else. It only makes sense that you would want me out of the way so you can have him to yourself again."</p><p>"I see," Chani bit out. She'd still been confused at the beginning of Irulan's rant, but by the end of it she was clearly just as angry as Irulan herself felt. Irulan could see her hands clenched into fists at her side, and she was sure that the Fremen had to restrain herself from letting her anger fully explode. "If you actually believe that, we have nothing more to talk about. And if you're speaking out of anger and frustration over what happened with Paul last night, I understand, but either way I think it's obvious that nothing good will come of me staying here right now."</p><p>Irulan said nothing as Chani left, closing the door behind her with more force than was strictly necessary. It didn't take long for Irulan's anger to deflate, and soon after that she actually felt remorseful for what she'd said to Chani. She didn't believe any of it, but had lashed out at Chani in her anger. She hadn't deserved that. She would have to speak to Chani later and smooth things over. Unfortunately that still wasn't her biggest problem. </p><p>How was Chani going to react when she found out Irulan was pregnant with Paul's child--a child that Chani had always wanted to give him but had never been able to, something Irulan had been directly responsible for?</p><p>--</p><p>Paul Atreides sat on the balcony and stared out at the sea. He was back on his childhood home of Caladan, but he did not feel at ease. He was still reflecting on a vision he'd had the previous night while he was sleeping. Most people had dreams, but Paul tended to have visions.</p><p>His interpretation of this vision led him to believe that he now had a method available to him by which he could thwart the Tleielaxu and their plots for good, and in the process might even manage to restore Duncan Idaho to the man he'd been before he was killed and turned into the ghola named Hayt. Even this did not fill him with joy or relief though, because the execution of this method would involve putting himself in great personal peril.</p><p>Chalice, the blonde haired woman who had spoken with him in the vision, had warned him not to go through with this plan and put himself at risk. He understood her argument, but he believed that this path was the right one for him to take, however treacherous it might be.</p><p>That wasn't the only reason for his restlessness. He also felt remorseful over the things he'd said to Irulan during their argument a few days earlier, which was the last time they'd spoken. He knew it had not been fair to speak with her that way or say those things, but had not yet spoken with her or made any attempt to mend that rift.</p><p>Paul heard footsteps, but he didn't bother to look up. He knew who was coming. "You called for me, my Lord?"   </p><p>"I did, Hayt," he said. It felt strange sometimes, to call this ghola with Duncan Idaho's face and Duncan Idaho's voice by another name, but it was best to keep the distinction in mind for now. "How are you enjoying Caladan?"</p><p>"I'm not sure how to answer that question, my Lord," the ghola said.</p><p>"Has being here brought back any memories of your previous life?" Paul asked. He didn't expect any change, but it couldn't hurt to ask.</p><p>"No more than before," Hayt said. "Certain feelings of familiarity occur, but that is all. I have no memories of the past life I lived on this planet."</p><p>"I see." It was what he had expected to hear. "Well, perhaps a trip to your old home might help. Would you like to visit Castle Caladan tomorrow?"</p><p>--</p><p>Around the same time that Paul Atreides was making plans for the following day with the Duncan Idaho ghola known as Hayt, his wife Irulan was taking a walk down to the beach that was near the palace. Ironically she felt the same sort of guilt that Paul felt, though hers was directed at Chani. She knew it had been unfair to lash out at Chani and accuse her of things she obviously had no part in. Chani had been kinder to her than essentially anyone else since she’d arrived on Arrakis, and had shown no anger towards her even after she’d returned and discovered that the rumors that had spread during her absence about Paul finally touching his wife were true. There were plenty of people Irulan felt she could be justifiably angry at, but Chani was not one of them. She really should apologize to her soon.</p><p>That wasn’t her only worry. She continued to grapple with the decision of when she should tell Paul about her pregnancy. Obviously she wouldn’t be able to keep it to herself forever; it would come out soon enough. But should she tell him now, when things were still so raw and bitter between them? Or should she wait and hope that there might at least some sort of easing of the tension before she told him what had happened, and tried to learn whether it had been a mistake or a deliberate decision on his part? There were no easy answers that she could see, and she had no one she could really turn to for advice.</p><p>Her head snapped up from the sand in front of her when she heard what sounded like a woman’s voice coming from somewhere up ahead. She walked forward cautiously, and two indistinct figures gradually came into view. Irulan recognized them as the athletic brunette and the friendly black-haired woman in the blue hat who had been with that strange researcher from Richese who had been spouting wild theories about time travel. The eccentric man didn’t appear to be with them this time, which Irulan wasn’t sure whether to be happy or disappointed about. He was strange, to be sure, but she’d found him interesting all the same, even if he’d soon slipped from her mind since their conversation was interrupted by Scytale arriving and revealing the Idaho ghola to them.</p><p>The brunette, who Irulan now recalled named Suzuha, was skimming stones across the water, and doing an excellent job of it as well. The black-haired woman, Mayuri, had a book in her lap and was reading aloud from it.</p><p>“…and as her silvery glow faded he turned back to Snape, and his eyes were full of tears,” she read. Irulan walked closer, not wanting to disturb her. She bent down to glance at the cover of the book, but her eyes narrowed when she saw its writing. It was not written in Galach, as she had been expecting. She was educated enough to recognize its strange symbols as belonging to the ancient language known as ‘Japanese’, though she did not possess the ability to read it. None of the Bene Gesserit had that ability. She doubted anyone had been able to do so for generations, aside from Paul who was an anomaly in so many ways. How could this woman, who honestly did not give Irulan the impression of being uncommonly intelligent, read this forgotten language?</p><p>“I still say the movie version of this part was even better,” Suzuha said, continuing to look out over the water. “The actor really brought the character to life.”</p><p>“After all this time?” Mayuri continued, but she broke off when she noticed Irulan hovering over her. “Oh! Hello, Irulan!” she said. “Alone today?”</p><p>“Yes,” she said simply. Since she didn’t want to talk about why this was so, she decided to change the subject. “What about you? Where’s that man you were with? Houhou-something?”</p><p>Suzuha chuckled, but it was Mayuri who answered. “Okabe had a meeting today, so Suzuha and I decided to enjoy the weather. Caladan really is beautiful!”</p><p>“It is,” Irulan said. Then she decided to ask what was really on her mind. “That book’s written in Japanese, right?” Mayuri nodded. “So how come you can read it? That language has been dead for thousands of years.”</p><p>Suzuha stopped tossing her stones, though she still didn’t turn around. “We originally came from a place where it’s still taught,” she said.</p><p>“Is that so? I don’t think I know of any such places,” Irulan said, feeling out of her depth.</p><p>“No, I wouldn’t think you would,” Suzuha said. Irulan got the impression that she wasn’t going to get an answer any more forthright than that, so she decided to ask something else.</p><p>“Did this, uh, Okabe come from that same place?” she asked.</p><p>“Uh huh!” Mayuri said, smiling and nodding at her. “He came with us when we left! Or we came with him, I guess I should say.”</p><p>“And how did you wind up doing that?” Irulan asked. “How did the three of you become traveling companions?” They seemed like an odd trio.</p><p>“I was Okabe’s friend since I was little,” Mayuri said. “Plus I was his hostage, so I <em>had </em>to follow him!”</p><p>“Hostage?” Irulan said, raising her eyebrows.</p><p>“It’s not as bad as it sounds, trust me,” Suzuha said. “As for me, I left a bad place to come to where Okabe was. I knew something bad was going to happen, but no one else did, so I came to try and stop it. I got mixed up with Okabe, one thing led to another and, well…here we are.”</p><p>“I see,” Irulan said. She didn’t see much at all, actually, but she didn’t expect any more information than that.</p><p>“And what brings you to the beach today, Irulan?” Mayuri asked. “You look like you have something on your mind.”</p><p>“I do,” she said, nodding. “I was hoping a walk would help.”</p><p>“Is it?” Suzuha asked, turning around and looking at her curiously.</p><p>Irulan shook her head. “Not really, no.”</p><p>“Maybe you should talk about it,” Mayuri suggested. “I know that talking about my problems with someone usually makes me feel better, even if there isn’t an obvious answer.”</p><p>“I don’t really have that option,” she admitted. “I’m rather short on confidants, and those that I might consider are a bit too close to the situation.”</p><p>“Why not tell us?” Mayuri offered, smiling at her.</p><p>It was on the tip of Irulan’s tongue to decline the offer as politely as she could. She didn’t often open up to anyone these days, and these two were strangers. Opening up and confiding in people she didn’t even know was completely out of character for her. But she didn’t refuse. There was just something about Mayuri’s open, friendly, unassuming smile that lowered Irulan’s guard, and without really understanding why she was doing so, Irulan began to speak.</p><p>“I’m concerned about this ‘gift’ that the Bene Tleilax have given my husband,” she began.</p><p>“The ghola, you mean?” Suzuha said.</p><p>Irulan nodded. “Yes. I believe that the ghola will be used as a weapon against Paul. Even the ghola itself thinks the same, and actually advised Paul to send it away before that could happen. But he refuses to listen, to it or to me. We had an argument about it. A rather vicious one.”</p><p>“I hate it when I argue with my friends,” Mayuri said, frowning. “I hope you guys can make up soon.” Irulan just shrugged helplessly. She didn’t know if it would be that simple.</p><p>“That’s not all, is there?” Suzuha asked.</p><p>“No,” Irulan acknowledged. “There’s something else, aside from the argument. I need to tell him something, but I don’t know whether I should yet.” That was as much information as she was going to give these two. She knew she would be questioning where her usual rationale had gone later when she thought about how much she’d revealed to two strangers, but there were still some things she wouldn’t say.</p><p>“Do you think he is a good man?” Mayuri asked, surprising Irulan.</p><p>She thought about it for several long seconds, and then nodded slowly. “I do,” she said finally, surprising herself somewhat with the admission. She had plenty of reason to hate him, after the years of ignoring her and leaving her to her loneliness, the weeks of abuse when she hadn’t wanted to share his bed and his casual dismissal of her after she’d allowed herself to think there might be something more than just sex between them. He had done bad things, to her personally as well as to the wider universe, but at the heart of it she believed he was a decent person.</p><p>“Not everyone would agree,” she continued. “The Jihad is an awful thing, and far too many have suffered and died in its name. But he didn’t mean for it to happen. He’s given many a reason to despise him, but in the balance of it all I believe he is a good man.”</p><p>“Then you should tell him soon,” Mayuri said. “If he’s a good man, you two will figure it out together.”</p><p>Irulan nodded slowly, and she was still mulling over Mayuri’s words when they heard someone else approaching. She turned around to see Chani approaching, and Irulan stiffened, wondering if they were going to pick up where they left off and Chani was going to berate her for what she’d said when last they spoke. Perhaps it was what she deserved.</p><p>Chani didn’t look angry though. She looked as if she wanted to speak civilly, and Irulan let herself relax slightly. “Hello,” Chani said, looking at Irulan briefly before regarding the other two with a friendly smile. “I hate to interrupt, but I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind if I spoke to Irulan alone?”</p><p>“Of course not!” Mayuri said. “We’ll leave you two to talk.”</p><p>“Yeah, probably time that we were getting back anyway,” Suzuha said. The two of them said their goodbyes and made their exit, and Irulan was left alone with the woman she’d unfairly yelled at.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” Chani said once they were alone, and Irulan blinked.</p><p>“<em>You’re </em>sorry?” she said. Wasn’t she the one who should be apologizing?</p><p>“Yes,” Chani nodded. “For suggesting that you should approach Scytale again, after I’d already mentioned it once before and you weren’t interested. I’m sorry if it made you suspicious or gave you the wrong impression.”</p><p>“No,” Irulan said, shaking her head. “No, I’m the one who should be apologizing. I was just taking my anger and my frustration out on you, and it wasn’t fair. You’ve given me no reason to doubt you, and your suggestion was logical.”</p><p>Chani smiled. “Yes, well, I won’t bring it up again,” she said. “Would you like to go back to my chambers for some coffee? There’s something else I’d like to talk to you about.”</p><p>“Of course,” Irulan said. “Lead the way.”</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan accepted the cup from Chani and took her first sip while waiting for the other woman to seat herself. She remained silent, knowing that since Chani had been the one to seek her out and invite her back here, she must have something on her mind and would speak when she was ready.</p><p>“I assume I don’t have to ask whether or not Paul has visited your chambers either of the past two nights,” Chani began.</p><p>Irulan smiled bitterly. “You do not.” Given what he’d said to her the last time he was in her chambers, maybe that was for the best.</p><p>“He hasn’t visited mine in that time either,” Chani said, and this surprised Irulan. With Paul no longer touching her, she’d assumed he was having sex with Chani more regularly than usual. That he hadn’t been sleeping with his longtime lover either was peculiar indeed.</p><p>“You two didn’t have any sort of argument, did you?” she asked.</p><p>Chani shook her head. “No, we didn’t. I haven’t been able to get any answers out of him, but something seems to be bothering him. And I very much doubt that it’s solely his argument with you.”</p><p>“You’re probably right,” Irulan agreed. She couldn’t imagine Paul ignoring his actual lover just because he was no longer speaking to the woman who was legally his wife. “Do you have any idea what it might be?”</p><p>“The only thing I can come up with is that the ghola must be consuming his thoughts,” Chani said.</p><p>Irulan wondered whether that was it. No doubt the ghola was on his mind a lot, but could that be all? Her mind returned to her own predicament and her questions about whether or not Paul had made a mistake or if he’d intentionally allowed her to become pregnant. Maybe it hadn’t been a mistake. Maybe he already knew, even, and that had something to do with why he was ignoring Chani.</p><p>“I should tell you something,” she said. It was a possibility that this could be the explanation for Paul ignoring Chani, but aside from that Irulan felt like she should know. She needed to tell <em>someone</em>, and why shouldn’t it be the woman who was Paul’s lover? It concerned her more than most.</p><p>“I’m pregnant,” Irulan said. She knew it didn’t need to be said who the father was. Chani surely knew that Paul was the only man who had ever shared her bed.</p><p>Chani’s eyes went wide with shock as she stared at her mutely for a few seconds, but then she smiled. “Congratulations,” she said, breaking the silence. “I’m happy for you.”</p><p>The strangest thing to Irulan was that she believed it. Chani seemed genuinely happy for her, and it wasn’t the reaction she’d expected at all. “You really mean that, don’t you?”</p><p>“Yes, of course,” Chani said. “I’m glad that you can give Paul a child, especially since I haven’t been able to after all these years.”</p><p>Irulan had felt her mood improving when Chani seemed genuinely pleased for her, but it was extinguished in an instant with those words. Chani had shown her kindness; more kindness than anyone else in Arrakeen in the five years since the war had ended. But she wouldn’t be nearly so kind if she knew the truth behind why she had been unable to conceive for all these years. She’d kept this secret all along, but she decided she needed to come clean now. It might very well ruin whatever peace existed between them, but she couldn’t conceal the truth from Chani any longer.</p><p>“Did Paul tell you that he was putting contraceptives into my food and drink after he started having sex with me, to make sure I wouldn’t get pregnant?” Irulan asked, ignoring her misgivings and broaching the subject.</p><p>“No,” Chani said, frowning. “No, he never told me that. But if that’s true, how did you—“</p><p>“That’s what he told me he was going to do, after he claimed me for the first time,” Irulan said, interrupting her. “He said that he was going to put in the same contraceptives that I’d been putting into <em>your </em>food and drink for all those years, before you left for the Palmaries.”</p><p>Chani just stared at her again, much like she had when Irulan had told her she was pregnant, but it was very different now. Before she’d just been surprised, but now there was a sense of anger in that confused stare.</p><p>“You were putting the same <em>contraceptives </em>in my food and drink? Is that what you said?” Chani bit out. It was still shock more than anything else that stood out on Chani’s face, but Irulan knew that it was going to give way to fury soon enough once the gravity of Irulan’s words and deeds fully set in.</p><p>“Yes,” Irulan said, nodding. She knew that everything would change between them after this, but she pushed forward. It was too late to change her mind or turn back now, so all that was left was to stand up straight and own up to the truth. “I was putting contraceptives into your food and drink for the last five years, on the orders of the Bene Gesserit. They wanted Paul’s heir to be conceived by me, for the sake of their breeding program, and so you could not be allowed to grow pregnant. I am truly sorry.”</p><p>“You’re sorry, are you?” Chani said, staring at her. The transition from shock to anger was well underway now, and her lips curled into a snarl. “Oh, well I guess it’s all fine then, as long as you’re <em>sorry!</em>!”</p><p>“I understand,” Irulan said. “You have every right to be angry with me, but—“</p><p>“Of course I have every right to be angry!” Chani screeched. “I don’t need your fucking permission to be angry with you for sabotaging my dreams for all these years!”</p><p>“You’re right,” Irulan said. “It was the Bene Gesserit’s command, but I shouldn’t have listened to them. I should have broken from them sooner, and—“</p><p>“Don’t you dare try to pass this blame off on someone else!” Chani snapped. “It wasn’t any of those witches who slipped those contraceptives to me; it was you! <em>You </em>are responsible for me never giving Paul any more children, after your father’s men killed the first when he was but two years old! I should claim your water for this!”</p><p>Irulan knew that she had wronged Chani, and she accepted that she had every right to be angry with her. But her anger and her frustration over her own situation boiled once again as Chani yelled and threatened her, and she suddenly decided to stop apologizing and start shouting back.</p><p>“Yes, I denied you the right to have children,” she admitted, “but at least you still had friends and someone who loved you! I had no one! It isn’t as if anyone cared about how lonely I was in Arrakeen! And I was denied the children I wanted too, just like you were! He didn’t feed me contraceptives back then, because there was no need. He would’ve had to touch me, or even to <em>look </em>at me, for that to be necessary!”</p><p>“Oh, I’ve heard enough of your pitiful attempts to excuse what you did!” Chani screamed. Then she threw a punch at Irulan, who was shocked that she’d gone beyond mere words and actually thrown a blow. But her training kicked in just in time and she was able to narrowly dodge Chani’s fist before it could make contact with her cheek.</p><p>Irulan wasn’t just going to take that. She was as angry as Chani was, albeit for different reasons, and if Paul’s Fremen concubine wanted to loose her anger through violence, that sounded like a good idea to Irulan as well. She answered Chani’s punch with one of her own, and though it didn’t fully connect, it felt good to take a swing at something.</p><p>Chani seemed to feel the same way, because she fought back. The two women traded blows, and even if none of them were decisive or even particularly effective, they were cathartic. Both women were frustrated and nervous and angry, and with Paul not visiting either of their beds this was as good a way to release all of that pent-up energy as either of them had found in days.</p><p>Irulan was breathing heavily by the time the effort to swing her arm felt like it wasn’t worth it any more, and Chani seemed to reach that point at roughly the same time. They were both gasping and winded, too winded to fight any more even though they were still standing so close to one another. Irulan felt better than she had in days. Apparently what she’d needed wasn’t to talk about her problems but simply to release all of her anger in a flurry of physical activity.</p><p>It wasn’t just her anger that she’d loosened her grip on, but also apparently her inhibitions. She was so close to Chani, closer than she’d ever been, and just as she had during their fight she didn’t think about what she was doing. She just acted, her body moving independently of her mind as it closed the short distance between their bodies and pressed her lips against Chani.</p><p>She could feel Chani gasp in shock against her lips, and Irulan’s eyes widened. She was as shocked by what she’d just done as Chani was, as this wasn’t something she’d consciously chosen to do but something that had just happened. But before she could even think about pulling back or apologizing for her actions, actions that she still couldn’t understand herself, Chani’s lips moved against hers. Chani wasn’t trying to pull back either; she was returning the kiss.</p><p>The returned physical affection from Chani silenced all of Irulan’s worries and confusion, and she no longer thought about pulling her lips away. It was like a switch had been flipped within them both, and the adrenaline that had led to their fight had continued on and led them to this instead. Their lips moved against each other with energy and passion and heat, and somewhere along the way their tongues began to duel and their hands started exploring each other’s bodies, rubbing and groping at whatever was within reach.</p><p>When they broke their kiss it was only so they could begin to undress each other. Irulan removed Chani’s simple shirt and trousers quickly enough, and then they worked together to slip Irulan’s dress off of her body. When they were down to nothing but their panties, Irulan noticed Chani’s eyes taking in her body. They lingered on her chest, and Irulan smiled. She welcomed that look, especially in this moment with what they’d already done, and what she hoped they were going to continue to do.</p><p>“Your breasts are gorgeous,” Chani commented. “I’ve always known that, of course, but seeing them bared like this is something else. They’re perfect.”</p><p>“Thank you,” Irulan said. She wasn’t the first to comment on her breasts, but Irulan would take the compliment any time. “Yours are very nice too.” She wasn’t merely trying to return the favor or reassure Chani that she found her attractive too; she meant it. Chani’s breasts might not be anywhere near as large as Irulan’s, but they were perky and looked perfect on her smaller body.</p><p>Chani didn’t stop at staring at Irulan’s breasts for long. She soon took them into her hands and squeezed them, and Irulan smiled at her look of open fascination as she fondled them. Irulan decided that Chani shouldn’t be the only one having fun, so she grabbed the other woman’s breasts for a little experimentation of her own.</p><p>Irulan could easily imagine why Chani seemed so fascinated with squeezing her breasts, because she had quite a bit of fun herself. She’d only had her own breasts for serious examination and play up until now, and teaching Irulan how to sexually pleasing other women hadn’t been a focus of the Bene Gesserit as they trained her for her future role. Chani’s smaller breasts felt so different in her hands compared to her larger chest, and she found that she liked the change. She also liked the way that Chani groaned when she groped her, so she kept it up.</p><p>She might have been disappointed when Chani stopped squeezing her breasts, if it hadn’t been for the fact that the Fremen woman leaned her head in and began to suck on one of her tits instead. Irulan gasped, not having expected that, but that didn’t mean she didn’t like it. She groaned and ran her hands through Chani’s red hair, encouraging her to keep going. Chani took her groans and her hands threading through her hair as the signs of approval that they were, and she not only kept going but moved her head across to give the other breast the same treatment.</p><p>“My turn,” Irulan said eventually, feeling that Chani deserved to feel the same thing she just had. She wouldn’t pretend it was some selfless deed though, because she absolutely wanted to suck on Chani’s adorable breasts as well. Chani allowed her to do so, and Irulan dove in. She’d never done anything like this and had never expected to. Her only sexual experiences up until this point had been with Paul, and though she didn’t know it to be fact she assumed that the same was true for Chani. They were likely learning all of this together, and Irulan was thrilled to have the lovely red-haired Fremen as her partner for all of these new discoveries.</p><p>Sucking on Chani's breasts was incredible fun for Irulan, and she hoped to have a chance to do so again in the future. But when Chani pushed her back gently, sank down to her knees in front of her and pulled her underwear off, Irulan was happy to put her breast sucking on hold for the time being.</p><p>Irulan had felt Paul's mouth on her more than once, and towards the end it had become an increasingly common part of their sexual routine. But there was something uniquely erotic about having a woman down on her knees in front of her, and Chani putting her hands on her and burying her head between her legs was a sight that Irulan would not soon forget.</p><p>Of course it was not the sight that she was most concerned with, but the pleasure. She was pretty sure that Chani had no more experience with other women than she herself did, but if Chani was doing this for the first time it did not show in her performance at all. Perhaps her tongue didn't move with quite as much skill as Paul's did when he licked her like this, and she didn't find the specific points and pressure that really got her going, which Paul had already learned and committed to memory and had used to great effectiveness on her ever since.</p><p>But she made up for any lack of skill or practice with simple enthusiasm, and Irulan greatly enjoyed the effort. So what if she didn't know to use her tongue on her clit or move her fingers inside of her a certain way, techniques that Paul had long since perfected? Her tongue wriggled against Irulan with a sort of energy that she couldn't get enough of, and she wasn't shy about pressing her head in close and even moving it from side to side, rubbing against her pussy with the surprisingly soft skin of her face.</p><p>Maybe this was the kind of thing Chani liked when she was receiving such attention from Paul, or perhaps she was just diving in and doing whatever came naturally to her. Whatever the case, it worked for Irulan. It wasn't the concentrated and skillful oral sex that she'd become accustomed to from Paul, but it was wild, playful and experimental all at the same time, and it worked for Irulan.</p><p>She might not have gotten off quite as quickly as she would have when it was Paul's head between her legs, especially if he was determined to go straight for it, but she still came, and came hard at that. She grabbed onto the back of Chani's head and her hips humped forward and rocked against her face as she was licked to orgasm by another woman for the first time. She dearly hoped that it would not be the last.</p><p>Chani's face was sticky and wet when Irulan's quivering stopped and she pulled her head back, and Irulan stared down at her with a deep hunger that demanded to be satisfied. "Get up here," she said, holding her hand down towards her. Chani took the hand and allowed her to pull her back to her feet, and she did not fight it when Irulan pulled her over towards the bed and shoved her down onto the bd. They'd thrown plenty of blows at each other earlier, before Irulan's lips acted of their own accord and they'd found a new way to release their energy, but this was the first time either of them had knocked the other off of their feet.</p><p>There was no anger in Chani, not now. She giggled as her back hit the bed, and the giggle turned into more of a groan as Irulan climbed onto the bed with her and got down on her belly between her legs.</p><p>"Ooh, I like the way you look down there," Chani said.</p><p>"I feel the same way," Irulan said as she hooked her thumbs into Chani's panties and pulled them down her legs. She tossed them aside, not caring where they landed. "I also like the look of this."</p><p>She'd seen naked women, aside from herself, but she'd never examined any of them from this close. Chani's cunt looked appetizing, and if her own looked nearly as good it was easy for her to understand why the Fremen had seemed so eager to lick her.</p><p>Irulan appreciated the wild and energetic way Chani had licked her and given her all to please her, but she did not choose the same approach for herself. Even if she'd never been trained on how to please a woman specifically, the lessons about taking the time to figure out what your partner wanted most and giving it to them still took hold of her and influenced her actions now. She licked tentatively at first, not out of any sense of nervousness but merely because she was gauging what worked for Chani and what didn't. She didn't dive straight in; she dipped her toe in, figuratively speaking, and tested the waters. When one technique or point of focus didn't get the reaction she wanted she switched to another, constantly shifting and searching for that point that would work wonders.</p><p>Eventually she found it. Chani didn't seem to react to a tongue on her clit the way that Irulan always did when Paul did it for her, but when Irulan tried rubbing at her clit with her fingers and slid her tongue inside of her cunt, she found the approach that made Chani moan louder than at any point so far. It was a very different focus than what Irulan herself enjoyed, but she was more than happy to give it to her.</p><p>She used her mouth and her fingers on Chani, continuing to focus on and exploit her discovery. She was rewarded for her focus with Chani's loud voice and her strong hands fisting in her hair, and the Fremen woman began to buck wildly as the pleasure continued and she grew closer to orgasm. That made it more difficult for Irulan to keep everything running smoothly, but she was determined to succeed. After how good Chani had made her feel, she deserved nothing less.</p><p>"Yes, Irulan!" Chani shouted. She didn't care if those outside of her chambers could hear her cries of pleasure, and Irulan didn't care either. "Yes, yes, yes!"</p><p>Irulan felt very pleased with herself as she brought Chani off, giving her pleasure that she apparently hadn't experienced in several days. She took Chani's screams and her bucking hips as a sign of how good a job she'd done and she couldn't help but smile smugly as she pulled back.</p><p>"You're looking quite cocky down there," Chani said once she'd settled down enough to look at her clearly.</p><p>"Am I?" Irulan said, grinning unapologetically. "What are you going to do about it?"</p><p>Chani returned her smile, sat up and then sprang into action with a speed that stunned Irulan. The Fremen wrapped her arms around her and rolled her around on the bed, but this wrestling was playful as opposed to the very real strikes they'd been throwing earlier. They wound up with Chani sitting and Irulan draped over her knees, and while Irulan did make some attempts to squirm out of her grip, they weren't exactly earnest. She was quite happy to be in Chani's grasp, but a little playful resistance seemed like a good idea.</p><p>"Don't get too full of yourself," Chani said. "If you do, this is what's going to happen to you." She pulled her hand back and brought it down across Irulan's ass, and Irulan moaned. Another spank followed, and then another, and another. Chani wasn't truly hitting her with all of her might, but she had no reason to. She wasn't trying to genuinely hurt her or punish her for anything. The anger from earlier was gone, and this was purely a playful spanking. Irulan gasped and sighed her way through it, happy to let Chani have her way with her.</p><p>"Have you learned your lesson?" Chani asked while rubbing her ass with her hand.</p><p>"Yes, absolutely," Irulan said. "Though I can't promise I won't act up again in the future. If I do, you may need to give me a reminder."</p><p>"Don't worry," Chani said. "I will be more than happy to put you in line again if you act out." She rolled Irulan back over onto her back, spread her legs and put one of her own legs between them. "But as for right now, if you've learned your lesson I think we should do something more enjoyable for both of us."</p><p>The spanking had been pretty enjoyable from Irulan's perspective, but when Chani positioned herself so her cunt was pressed directly against hers she was more than happy to put it aside. Chani began to move, rubbing their cunts together, and Irulan gasped. This wasn't a sexual act she'd given any serious thought to before now. With Paul there was never much need to try and find any pleasure in the friction of rubbing together, as between oral sex and actual penetration there was already enough to satisfy her.</p><p>There could be no penetration here between her and Chani, obviously, but Irulan quickly decided that this was not as big an issue as she might have assumed it would be. The friction of Chani's cunt rubbing against hers felt better than Irulan had assumed it might, and she soon began to work her own hips as well. She left it up to Chani to do most of the work, but Irulan wiggled and rubbed when she felt it was appropriate and might enhance her pleasure as well as Chani's.</p><p>Chani seemed to be putting quite a bit of effort into it. It reminded Irulan of how hard she would have to work when mounted on top of Paul and taking his cock for a ride, and she appreciated all of the work Chani was putting in for both their sakes. The stimulation was considerable, and it got dialed up considerably any time that Chani brushed against her clit just right.</p><p>"Let me know if you get tired and want me to take over for a bit," Irulan offered.</p><p>"Maybe next time," Chani said, and Irulan smiled at the prospect of a next time for this and for them. "But I have more than enough energy to keep going."</p><p>Irulan knew the feeling. After what had become a very active sex life with Paul, going several days without any physical contact had been more frustrating than Irulan had known it would be. Chani was in the same position, for whatever reason, and she seemed just as eager to sate her hunger as Irulan was. Who knew when or even if Paul would ever return to Irulan's bed, but she'd found a more than satisfactory way to release her lust in the form of the other woman her husband was currently leaving wanting.</p><p>Chani must have felt just as sexually frustrated as Irulan did, and just as happy to find someone who she could release all of this on. She moved her body urgently, grinding against Irulan in a way that suggested she needed this badly and would go all out to get the pleasure that had been denied to her for days. Her urgency was welcomed by Irulan, who was right there with her every step of the way, moaning and sighing as the other woman undulated against her.</p><p>“Chani,” she groaned as her pleasure increased. This wasn’t just about getting her satisfaction, but about whom it was that was giving it to her. She could remember when she was still new to Arrakis, when she’d compared her own body to Chani’s and been sure that her victory was guaranteed, sure that Paul Atreides would not be able to resist her classic beauty that stood as an example of the success of generations of the Bene Gesserit breeding program, for some wild Fremen woman.</p><p>Chani had been pretty in her own way, Irulan hadn’t ever denied that, but her looks could in no way match up to Irulan’s own. It had only been a matter of time before Paul could not resist the temptation any longer and would come to her bed, or so she’d believed back then.</p><p>She’d been wrong, and for quite some time she hadn’t been able to understand why. Her thoughts and feelings about both Paul and Chani had already changed significantly compared to where they were five years earlier. But it was here and now where Irulan at last felt that she could not only understand why Paul had never strayed from his Fremen lover for those years, but she could say she might have made a similar choice. She felt drawn in by Chani’s wildness and energy, captivated by the way her red hair moved as she moved that lithe body of hers against Irulan’s. All of her worries, her concerns about Paul, the ghola, her pregnancy and everything else, faded away into nothingness. It was Chani and only Chani on her mind, Chani and the way that the Fremen woman was making her feel.</p><p>Irulan cried out Chani’s name as she came, and it seemed to trigger even greater desire in Chani, who moved her hips even harder from that point on. It didn’t take much longer for Chani to scream her way through an orgasm of her own, and she shouted out Irulan’s name as she did so.</p><p>Irulan smiled, thinking she’d never heard anything sweeter than her name on Chani’s lips as she came.</p><p>--</p><p>Some time later, after both she and Chani were completely exhausted and utterly sated, Irulan stretched out in bed beside the other woman. She could scarcely remember the last time she’d felt so at peace. It was since before her argument with Paul, certainly. Perhaps it had been even longer. Before Scytale presented him with the Duncan Idaho ghola? Before she was attacked in Sietch Ashar, even?</p><p>Her sense of satisfaction and comfort led her to be more open with her feelings than the Bene Gesserit had ever taught her to be. “I love Paul,” she admitted. It was true. In spite of everything, she loved him.</p><p>Chani didn’t look the least bit surprised by that. “I know,” she said simply.</p><p>Irulan wasn’t done with her revelations, however. “I love you too,” she said. Chani’s eyes opened more at that, but Irulan did not shy away. She stared at her seriously and faced her examination. This was something Irulan herself hadn’t consciously been aware of for all that long, but now that she’d faced her feelings she realized it had probably been true for quite some time. There’d been an idle appreciation of the kindness Chani had shown her, and the occasional flicker of physical attraction, but she’d always ignored exactly what it meant. She knew what it meant now though, and she wasn’t going to deny it or run from it. She was tired of running from her feelings and tired of hiding the truth.</p><p>Chani smiled at her, and when she saw that smile Irulan suddenly felt sure that everything would be okay. “I feel the same way,” the Fremen said. “About Paul, and about you too.” Chani pulled Irulan close to her, and they shared another kiss. It was altogether different than the kiss Irulan had impulsively planted on her at the beginning, the one that had ignited all of this. That one had been a release of energy, anger and pent-up sexual frustration. It was something that happened in the heat of the moment.</p><p>This kiss was slower, softer, and more deliberate. There wasn’t any heat or lust behind it, or not much of it at least. There was plenty of emotion and feeling behind it though. Whereas their first kiss had signaled the beginning of a frenzied sexual encounter, this kiss felt like it was the beginning of something else entirely, something deeper and more meaningful.</p><p>Irulan still didn’t know where she stood with Paul Atreides, but she felt far more certain about his Fremen concubine. Chani had gone from a rival standing between her and the heirs she wanted to have to someone Irulan cared for deeply, and the Fremen woman felt the same way about her. Whatever was to come, they would face it together.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Content Warnings/Themes: Femslash</p><p>Irulan/Chani</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Sorry</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>While Paul takes a risk at Castle Caladan, Irulan and Chani try to disrupt the Tleilaxu plot.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>"I am going to go to Castle Caladan today," Paul said. His mother looked surprised at that, but he knew the surprise was going to become something more serious when he explained just why he was going.</p><p>"Today?" she said. "Why today, of all days? You know that the attempt made on your life in Sietch Ashar is to be discussed today in the Landsraad."</p><p>"Yes, I know that," he said. "I will be happy to have you lead things and represent my interests today in my absence, but I expect today's meeting to be a farce. My trip to Castle Caladan is more important. I'll be taking the Duncan Idaho ghola with me in the hopes that I can restore his memories." She looked alarmed, so he sought to ease her fears at least slightly. "I'm planning on taking Gurney with me, assuming he'll agree." He knew that he would. Gurney had been convinced that the real Duncan was still present within Hayt, and he would jump at the chance to assist Paul in his attempt to bring him out.</p><p>"Don't you believe that it's important that you be at the meeting, even if it does turn out to be a farce?" she asked calmly, though he could tell it was a forced calm.</p><p>"No," he said bluntly. "I think the meeting may well turn out to be utterly irrelevant by the end of the day, if my prescience turns out to be accurate."</p><p>There was no hiding her concern now. "What have you seen?" she asked.</p><p>"I believe there is a fair chance that the Tleilaxu will make their move and try to attack me today while I'm at Castle Caladan," he said. "They might even use the Idaho ghola to do it." Her eyes widened and she was already shaking her head, but he kept talking. "But in doing so they will expose themselves, hence my saying that the meeting of the Landsraad will be left irrelevant."</p><p>"But what does it matter if it works?" the Lady Jessica objected. "It won't matter if they're exposed as long as they succeed in killing you. And if you only take Gurney and the ghola, who you expect might be used against you, they might succeed this time."</p><p>"They very well might," Paul agreed. He would be taking some of his Fedaykin with him, but not a large amount. It likely wouldn't be enough to stop a true assault. "But I believe that the risk is worth it if it means eliminating the Tleilaxu." One of his potential successors, the Tyrant, believed that the Tleilaxu were actually going to be important for the future of humanity and had thus refrained from destroying them in that future, but Paul disagreed. He felt that the universe would be better off without the Tleilaxu getting in the way. He had his own plans on how to save humanity from future extinction.</p><p>"I know I am in no position to order you to do anything, but please listen to me," Jessica said. "Do not go. Do not do this; do not take this risk. The Tleilaxu plot will be unraveled soon enough without you risking your life and placing it in the hands of the Idaho ghola, which has itself advised you to send it away. This is foolishness."</p><p>"I understand why you would say so, but I believe that this needs to be done," he said. His voice brooked no argument, and he saw his mother's shoulders sag as she accepted defeat. "Should I not return from my birthplace, I want you to lead a regency until my son is born. The Fremen have enough respect for you from your time among them that you should be able to control them until then."</p><p>"You have a child on the way?" Jessica said, surprised.</p><p>Paul nodded. "I do. Irulan is pregnant, though she hadn't told me that yet. Once she gives birth I would like for her to become regent until my son is of age."</p><p>"You've given this a great deal of thought, I see," she said. "It almost feels like you've arranged your own death."</p><p>He shook his head. "No. I don't intend to die today. I merely acknowledge that it is a possibility, and I don't want things to fall into chaos should that happen."</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan moaned as she rocked her hips slightly. It was difficult to stay still when she felt so good, but she tried not to move around too much. Chani was doing too good a job for Irulan to want to do anything to disturb her or make it any harder for her to lick her.</p><p>She was sitting atop the Fremen woman's face, and Chani was using her tongue so expertly that it seemed impossible that Irulan was the first woman she'd done this to. Maybe that just spoke to their compatibility, or to the passion they shared for each other. Chani was showing not just skill but eagerness as she used her mouth on Irulan.</p><p>She wasn’t pleasuring her just out of some obligation; she truly wanted her to feel good. On that objective she was more than succeeding. Her technique was not the same as Paul’s, but Irulan appreciated it all the same. Paul’s well-practiced tongue on her clit was effective, but Chani’s wriggling tongue felt damn good too. Technique and skill wasn’t something to be ignored, but neither was enthusiasm, and that was something that Chani possessed plenty of.</p><p>She was using her fingers a bit now as well, which was something she hadn’t really done the first time. They didn’t slide inside of her and brush against her at the perfect angle like Paul’s routinely did when he pleasured her, but the little rubs of her fingers still felt very good, especially when combined with Chani’s wriggling tongue and the way her face shifted and rubbed against Irulan’s pussy on occasion. It occurred to Irulan that Chani might be remembering what she’d done previously and was trying out some different things this time, and the idea was very exciting. She hoped for lots of chances for mutual experimentation between her and Chani, where they could learn all about each other’s bodies, what worked and what didn’t. Whatever happened between Irulan and Paul going forward, she hoped that she would be able to continue sharing this newfound pleasure with Chani.  </p><p>Chani had been licking for several minutes now, and Irulan knew it wouldn't be too much longer. She grabbed onto Chani's red hair and held on as the pleasure mounted. Chani responded in kind. Her tongue moved more intently and her fingers rubbed at her harder as she sensed Irulan’s oncoming pleasure and did all that she could to get her there and make it feel even more incredible for her.</p><p>"So close!" she gasped. "So close! More, more, more!" It wasn't like she needed to plead for it, because if she'd learned one thing so far it was that Chani wasn't going to stop until she'd been satisfied.</p><p>Chani did exactly that. Her tongue kept up its pressure until a scream burst from Irulan's throat and her body shook as she squirted all over the face of Paul's Fremen lover. As she moaned her way through her climax, Irulan made a mental correction. Chani wasn't just Paul's Fremen lover anymore. She was now Irulan's Fremen lover as well, improbable as that would have seemed to her not so long ago.</p><p>The improbability of it all lingered on Irulan's brain as she rolled off of Chani's face and onto the bed beside her, and she felt compelled to broach the subject.</p><p>"How have you forgiven me so quickly?" she asked, getting straight to the question on her mind. "I put contraceptives in your food for five years. I stopped you from getting pregnant and giving Paul the child you've always wanted with him. I'm surprised you didn't really try to kill me."</p><p>She knew that bringing that obvious point of contention up again could very well set Chani off all over again and ruin whatever it was that they had only just found. It hadn’t been so long ago that Chani had learned the truth, because Irulan had confessed it to her, and the Fremen had responded by attacking her. That the attack had eventually fizzled out and the energy and tension had turned into something sexual did not change that the reason for the friction had not truly gone away, and by bringing it up she might shatter this pleasant peace. Chani may very well try to attack her all over again, but Irulan felt the question needed to be asked regardless. If she tried to ignore it and pretend that this had never been between them, she would always wonder what had led to Chani going from fighting her to returning her kiss and giving her physical affection. </p><p>"If you were still the same person you were then, I probably <em>would </em>want to claim your water," Chani said, using the Fremen terminology. "And when you told me what you’d done, I lashed out at you. I won’t apologize for that, because I <em>did </em>have every right to be angry.”</p><p>“You did,” Irulan agreed. She had her reasons for doing what she’d done to Chani for all those years, but that didn’t eliminate the harm she’d done to Paul’s longtime lover by denying her the child she’d wanted for so long. She would have expected an act like that to take a great deal of time for Chani to forgive her for, if she would ever find it within herself to do so. That was precisely why she’d come right out and asked her why she’d seemingly put it behind her so quickly, and it was also why Irulan looked at her even now waiting for an explanation.</p><p>“But now I’ve had some time to cool off, not to mention having something else to put my energy towards,” Chani said. She smiled at Irulan, who smiled back. It had been a wonderful evening for Irulan, an evening that had now continued into the early morning, and it was flattering that Chani seemed to enjoy it as much as she had. “And having had that time, I’ve been able to look at things more calmly. I don't believe you're the person you were five years ago, or even a couple of months ago. The last couple of months have changed you, and I know that you're sorry for what you did. You wouldn't have admitted the truth to me if you weren't."</p><p>"I <em>am </em>sorry," Irulan said sincerely.</p><p>"I can even understand why you did what you did," Chani went on. "But there's another thing, and it's crucial." Chani shifted to look at her more closely. "It's in what you said when you told me the truth. Based on what you said, Paul seems to have known that you were putting those contraceptives in my food and yet he did nothing to stop you until recently. He must have had some reason why, though I can't figure out what it might be."</p><p>"Yes," Irulan said slowly. The very same question had puzzled Irulan for the last two months, ever since Paul first revealed that he knew about what she'd been doing. "It <em>is </em>strange that he knew but did nothing about it. I've wondered about that, but I can't make sense of it. And I never asked, because I doubted he would tell me the truth."</p><p>"Maybe we should ask him together?" Chani suggested.</p><p>"Yes," Irulan agreed, nodding. "We should."</p><p>"And not just about the contraceptives," Chani went on. "Let's confront him about all of it. The ghola, your pregnancy; everything."</p><p>"Let's do it," Irulan said. "When?"</p><p>"Why wait? Let's do it today," Chani said, and some of her Fremen hardness seemed to be coming out.</p><p>Irulan nodded. She'd been looking forward to spending most of the day in bed with her new lover, but Chani's determination inspired her. It was time to get their answers. "Today."</p><p>--</p><p>After cleaning themselves up, getting dressed and having a quick breakfast, the two women left Chani's chambers behind and went out in search of the one man who might hold the answers to all of their questions. But they found no sign of him, and could find no answers until they happened upon his sister Alia sitting by herself.</p><p>"Alia? Have you seen Paul?" Chani asked. Alia looked up at her and nodded.</p><p>"Yes," she said, "but you're too late if you're hoping to stop him."</p><p>"Stop him?" Irulan felt a sense of foreboding. "Stop him from doing what?"</p><p>"From leaving," Alia said. "He left this morning. He took a thopter to the castle."</p><p>"A thopter? With who?" Chani asked.</p><p>"With the Duncan Idaho ghola, Gurney Halleck and a dozen Fedaykin," Alia recited.</p><p>Irulan's foreboding only got worse, and a look at Chani confirmed that she felt the same way. That he would leave at all without bringing them with him or at least telling them was bad enough, but that he'd brought the ghola with him was far worse.</p><p>"Why would he leave today of all days?" Irulan asked aloud. "The assassination attempt that was made on us in Sietch Ashar is being discussed today in the Landsraad." It made no sense.</p><p>Alia shrugged. "I'm sure he had a good reason," she said carelessly. At times Alia could be almost harder to figure out than her older brother. Irulan couldn't understand why she seemed so unconcerned. She deeply feared that the Tleilaxu would make another attempt on Paul's life today while he was at Castle Caladan, and utilize the Idaho ghola to do it. Paul surely understood that this was a distinct possibility, so why had he gone?</p><p>There was no other alternative. Irulan knew what she had to do now, and she wasted no time in turning to Chani. "He's left me no choice," she said. "We're going to go with the idea you suggested. I'm going to go to Scytale and pretend I want in on the conspiracy against my husband. That's the only way we can try and get information out of him as quickly as possible."</p><p>Chani didn't bother trying to talk her out of it. She shared her desperation for answers, and this had been her idea in the first place. She only nodded and wished her luck.</p><p>Irulan left them both behind and went alone to seek out Scytale. He wasn't difficult to find in the little suite of rooms he and his people had been given, especially with the group surrounding him. He was accompanied by what Irulan strongly suspected were other face dancers, but she paid them no mind. She walked straight up to Scytale, who watched her approach without any apparent interest.</p><p>"Princess Irulan," he said by way of casual greeting when she got close. "To what do I owe the pleasure of your company?"</p><p>On the way over Irulan had debated the best way to play this. She'd briefly considered starting lightly, making small talk and slowly working her way up to why she was here, but she tossed that aside almost instantly. She didn't have time; she wanted to get to the bottom of this as soon as possible. Time was of the essence with Paul already having left for Castle Caladan, and besides, what would be the point of being coy? If she wanted to have any chance of convincing Scytale that she genuinely wanted in on his plot, being blunt and forward seemed like the best way to go. She even had some pieces of information she doubted he had.</p><p>"I wanted to speak with you privately," she said, glancing briefly at what she suspected were fellow face dancers surrounding him.</p><p>"Alas, given the delicate nature of things I believe it would be best for my attendants to remain," Scytale said. "Not that I suspect you of anything, princess, but there are many faces from many different groups here on Caladan right now, and not all of them are friendly towards the Bene Tleilax."</p><p>"Fair enough," she said. If he wanted his group to stay, it just meant they would have an audience. "I won't waste any of your time. I came to seek you out because I am well aware that the Tleilaxu council of masters was behind the attempt on Paul's life in Sietch Ashar that I got caught up in, and I know they're still plotting against Paul."</p><p>"You wound me, princess," Scytale said, in a voice that she assumed was meant to sound offended but sounded like it was openly mocking her instead. "I do understand why you might not trust my word on this, but I assure you that--"</p><p>"I didn't come here to threaten you," she said, cutting him off. She didn't have the time or the patience to listen to him spout the same nonsense he had before. They both knew it was false. "I'm here because I want in on the conspiracy. I want to help you destroy the monster that I have the misfortune to call my husband."</p><p>"I will once again state that neither I nor the Bene Tleilax council of masters had anything to do with that regrettable action taken by a rogue individual in Sietch Ashar, nor are we plotting anything against the emperor now," Scytale said. "But even with that being the case, I feel compelled to ask why you would wish to plot against your own husband?"</p><p>Here was a chance for Irulan to catch someone else by surprise for a change. "I want to save my child's life," she said. She noted with satisfaction the alarm that flickered across the face of the face dancer for just a moment. It was only due to her training and the fact that she had been specifically watching for it that she'd seen it at all, but it felt nice to be on the other side of one of these revelations.</p><p>"I wasn't aware you were pregnant," the face dancer said once he had a moment to recover from his brief surprise. "I would have assumed that the emperor would want to announce that publicly. I know plenty of questions have swirled about the stability of his rule with no heirs to speak of."</p><p>"He doesn't want an heir," Irulan said. "Not from me at least. He got me pregnant by mistake, and he wishes for me to abort the child." It felt like a very plausible motivation, especially given the information that was seemingly common public knowledge about her marriage, from Paul's stated intention way back when to only have children with Chani to the recent shift where he'd begun to sleep with Irulan. Even now she still wasn't sure whether Paul had meant to get her pregnant or not.</p><p>"I can see why this would concern you," Scytale said. "But what do you want from me, and from the rest of the Tleilaxu?"</p><p>"I want my child on the throne," she said. "That was why I consented to marry Paul Atreides in the first place, and I'm not going to let it slip through my fingers now that I've finally gotten him to give it to me. Once Paul is gone there will be no one to stand between my child and the throne, and the restoration of the Corrino dynasty that should have never been interrupted. And I will be happy to work with the Tleilaxu going forward, as will my children."</p><p>Scytale took some time to take all of that in, and she imagined that she could see his mind working behind that calm facade. Finally he spoke. "There's no point in hiding the truth from you, is there, Irulan Corrino?" he said. "Yes, you are correct. The face dancers have infiltrated Castle Caladan, and Paul Atreides will undoubtedly be dead by the end of the day. He was a fool to ever think he could restore Duncan Idaho, but of course he was. I counted on it." Irulan had to work hard not to show any sign of distress at how certain he was. Whether he trusted her or not she wasn't sure, but she doubted he would've said something like that so openly unless he was extremely confident in the success of his plan.</p><p>"It is good to hear that the tyrant will soon be dead," Irulan said, utilizing her Bene Gesserit training to try and convince him that she truly was happy at the prospect of her husband being killed, possibly at that very moment. "I look forward to working with the Tleilaxu." She was actually already looking ahead to how she might make use of this information, though she took care not to show it.</p><p>Scytale smirked at her. "Who said anything about us working together, princess?" he asked. "The Spacing Guild and your former friends in the Bene Gesserit, back when they were considering getting involved in the plot, were content simply to remove the Atreides, as are you, assuming you're actually being honest with me. But the Bene Tleilax have far loftier ambitions than that. For far too long has the known universe been governed by Powindah."</p><p>"Non-believers," Irulan said automatically. "Anyone who doesn't follow the Tleilaxu belief system." She believed she was beginning to understand the true end goals of the Tleilaxu now.</p><p>"To put it politely, yes," Scytale said. "It is time that the people of the Imperium come to know the truth of the Great Belief." Irulan thought back to when Scytale had spoken about the Tleilaxu's original plan to train Hayt as a Zensunni philosopher, before the mess in Sietch Ashar had caused them to gift him to Paul before that could happen. It was all coming together now. The Tleilaxu were every bit as fanatical about their religion as the Fremen were about theirs.</p><p>"The rumors about the Tleilaxu are true after all," she said. "You're Zensunni."</p><p>"You are correct again, princess," Scytale said. "We don't want to merely kill Paul Atreides and allow the system to continue on as it always has once he's gone. We want there to be as much chaos as possible following the death of the tyrant. That's the only way we can make our plans to expand the Yaghist, the realm of the Tleilaxu, into reality. And you cannot help us with that."</p><p>Irulan was suddenly reminded once again of the face dancers who remained in the room with them even now. Before they had just been an audience for a conversation she would rather have remained private, but now they felt like more of a threat. Her body tensed, and she wondered if she would have to fight for her life just like she had against the face dancers in Sietch Ashar. If so, she wouldn't be caught by surprise like before.</p><p>"To be honest with you, I don't care what your true motives in approaching me today were," Scytale said. "If you genuinely wanted to enter into an alliance with the Tleilaxu, your goals are too different from ours for any such partnership to be possible. And if you only came to me as a means of getting information out of me that might be used to save your husband, you are far too late for that. But regardless, it cannot come to light that you are pregnant. You must be taken care of forthwith."</p><p>"Are you really stupid enough to kill me here, with the Landsraad present and due to meet?" Irulan asked. "Even if you were to kill me and have a face dancer take my place, you would be quickly found out by Lady Jessica, her daughter Alia or anyone else at the Landsraad who has sufficient Bene Gesserit training."</p><p>"But we don't need to convince anyone for any real length of time," Scytale said, shaking his head. "We only need to replace you for a few hours. Only until the chaos following Paul's death begins to unfold. After that it will be too late for the Bene Gesserit or anyone else to do anything to stop us."</p><p>When the attack came, there was no obvious signal from Scytale to any of the other face dancers. One of them simply came to attack her with a knife, stabbing forward towards her ribs in what would likely have been a fatal blow had it landed. Irulan wasn't caught by complete surprise though. She dodged out of the way in time, and in a flash her own knife was in her hand. She hadn't expected to have to fight for her life, but she'd come prepared just in case, and now she thrust that knife into the throat of her attacker.</p><p>Scytale did not lament the loss of his subordinate. He just sighed. "Kill her," he said.</p><p>Irulan had her knife back in her hand and readied herself against the attack. The first face dancer to get within range took a stab wound to the side, but the numbers were against Irulan. She was preparing to attack another of them when a third hit her with a blow from her blind side that knocked her to the floor. Falling off of her feet was bad, but her knife flying out of her hand was far worse.</p><p>She believed she was finished at that moment, but before the face dancers could deliver a fatal blow something was lobbed into the room. There was a blinding flash of light that made Irulan wince and turn her head away, and a deafening boom that rang in her ears. But it served to disorient not just Irulan but also Scytale and all of the face dancers who had likely been seconds away from killing her.</p><p>When Irulan recovered from the temporary blindness and deafness she saw the brunette from before, Suzuha, kicking the face dancer closest to Irulan in the face. She then crushed its head underneath her foot, and turned to look at Irulan with all of the poise of a hardened and experienced warrior. This was a woman who had killed before.</p><p>"We need to get out!" Suzuha yelled. Her shout sank into Irulan's brain and got her to get moving again. She got up off of the floor, grabbing her knife as she did so. Suzuha pulled a small weapon out of her clothing, held it in her hands and pulled the trigger on it while pointing it at one of the face dancers. The projectiles it produced failed to penetrate the shield the face dancer was wearing, but it bought the two women enough time to flee the room.</p><p>"Follow them!" Irulan heard Scytale command as she made it out of the room. She didn't look back; she continued to run after Suzuha.</p><p>"How did you know I was there?" she shouted as they ran.</p><p>"I saw you approaching him earlier," Suzuha responded while continuing to move and not looking back. "I had a feeling it was going to be trouble." Irulan didn't press her on why she'd felt that way; she was just thankful the brunette had been there. If she hadn't been, Irulan doubted she would still be drawing breath.   </p><p>They continued to run until they turned a corner into a large chamber and saw Chani, Alia and a squad of Fedaykin moving towards them with great haste. Obviously they'd heard the commotion and run towards it, and it wouldn't surprise Irulan if Chani had summoned these Fedaykin to her and kept them on standby while she waited to see how Irulan's attempt to get information from Scytale went.</p><p>The face dancers were close behind Irulan and Suzuha, but the numbers were now decidedly against them with the arrival of Chani, Alia and the Fedaykin. When the two groups met it didn't take long to see who held the upper hand. The face dancers were picked off one by one by the Fremen and their superior numbers. Scytale saw that defeat was imminent, and rather than stay around and go down with the other face dancers he turned and fled from the chamber.</p><p>"I'm going to kill that fucker," Irulan muttered as she gave chase. Chani, Suzuha and a few of the Fedaykin joined her on the hunt while the rest remained to finish off what was left of Scytale's face dancers.</p><p>Scytale hadn't lifted a finger in the actual attack, which meant he had plenty of energy available to him during his flight. Despite Irulan's best efforts she could not catch up to him as he led his pursuers outside the palace and into the gardens. Suzuha pulled out her firearm again and tried to shoot him, but it had no effect thanks to his shield, leaving Irulan questioning why she'd bothered in the first place.</p><p>The chase continued, and Scytale had no intention of turning or engaging. He'd been more than happy to call for violence when it had been he and his face dancers surrounding Irulan alone, and encouraged giving chase when she'd been joined by only Suzuha, but now that their numbers had swelled and he was alone escape was his only objective. He used his face dancer ability to shift his appearance several times, usually doing so strategically as they ran by a startled group of people and there was a greater chance of Irulan and her group losing sight of him and thus giving him a chance to blend into the crowd and slip away. But Irulan was prepared for his tricks, and she remained in hot pursuit. She might be struggling to try and catch up, but she wasn't letting him pull away either.</p><p>They neared a smaller group of two bystanders, and to Irulan's horror she recognized them as her younger sisters Josifa and Rugi. They looked as startled as anyone else that the group had run through, and when Josifa recognized Irulan she looked to her for answers.</p><p>"Irulan, what's going on?" she shouted. Irulan willed her to get out of the way, but the second youngest of the Corrino sisters kept looking uncertainly between Scytale and Irulan. Before Irulan could shout out any warning, Scytale was on her. Josifa had undergone Bene Gesserit training of her own, but she was still confused and Scytale was too quick for her. The face dancer kicked her in the chest, and she was knocked backwards into a pool of water.</p><p>Irulan had no time to be concerned for Josifa, because immediately after kicking her aside Scytale grabbed Rugi, spun around and held her in front of him, putting her between himself and Irulan as a human shield.</p><p>"Don't come any closer, Princess Irulan," the face dancer said. He held a knife to the throat of her youngest sister, and Irulan knew he wouldn't hesitate to open her throat if he felt threatened. Irulan begrudgingly came to a stop, and held up her hands to motion for the rest of the group to do the same.</p><p>"That's better," Scytale said. He was smiling slightly, obviously feeling confident now that he had a hostage to use as protection. "Just keep your distance, and no one needs to get hurt here. Here's what's going to happen. You are going to bring an ornithopther to me, and I will depart safely. Once that is done, I'll--"</p><p>Irulan flinched as a knife suddenly embedded itself in Scytale's chest, cutting him off in mid-sentence. Scytale looked down at the knife in his chest in shock before he fell to his knees. Thankfully he didn't use his last moments of control to slice Rugi's throat in a final revenge, though it was almost definitely not out of any mercy or selflessness. It was far more likely that he'd been too surprised at the knife and wondering where it had come from.</p><p>Irulan shared his surprise; she hadn't thrown the knife, and she doubted anyone from her group was skilled enough to manage a throw like that; not without hitting Rugi too. There had been so little space between their bodies that it would have taken someone with masterful aim to hit Scytale without so much as nicking Rugi in the process.</p><p>"I believe your father would never have forgiven me if I hadn't gotten here in time," Count Fenring said, stepping out of the shadows. That seemed to answer the question of who had thrown the knife, but Irulan didn't have time to talk to Fenring right now, nor to reflect on the fact that he'd spoken without the hint of a stutter. She raced forward to check on Rugi, and confirmed for herself that she'd been unharmed. There was some blood on her dress, but it was Scytale's blood. Rugi herself had suffered no damage, though her face still showed her fright.</p><p>"Are you okay?" Irulan asked. She gave a shaky nod, and the sisters hugged. Josifa climbed out of the pool of water she'd been knocked into, and while her clothes were soaked through she was not harmed. Irulan's sisters had both survived their encounter with the face dancer.</p><p>There wasn't time to exhale though. Irulan and her group approached Scytale, who was on his knees with his head slumped. He wasn't bothering to try and remove the knife from his chest like some in his position might have; he knew that the knife had struck too deep and he'd lost too much blood for it to matter, and even if he hadn't there wasn't a person here who had any interest in healing him. He looked up when he heard their steps getting closer, and even though he knew he was moments from death he managed a bloody, shaking smile.</p><p>"You are fools if you think you have beaten Scytale," he rasped, and then he died. Irulan watched him breathe his last breath dispassionately. She'd already gotten as much information out of him as she could. It was just too bad she couldn't have killed him before Paul had foolishly walked right into his trap at Castle Caladan.</p><p>A hand on her arm caused Irulan to turn around, and she saw Chani looking at her seriously. "We heard the commotion and came running," Chani said. "What did you learn?"</p><p>"The face dancers set a trap for Paul at Castle Caladan, and like we figured, the ghola is part of it," Irulan said. There was still more to say about why the face dancers were acting, why Scytale had tried to kill her and what their end goal was, but this wasn't the time or the place to go into any detail.</p><p>"We need to get there immediately," Chani said. Irulan sighed and shook her head.</p><p>"I wish that we could," she said, "but Castle Caladan is more than a thousand miles north of here. It would take hours to get there by thopter. Even if we left right now, we're almost definitely going to be too late to put a stop the Tleilaxu's plans."</p><p>"Actually, I think I can help you there," Suzuha said, speaking up for the first time since it had been just the two of them fleeing, before the tide had turned and it was Scytale who was running away. "I might have a way of getting you to Castle Caladan a lot faster."</p><p>--</p><p>"This is ridiculous," Chani said. "Do you actually expect us to believe that you have traveled through time?"</p><p>"Think what you want," Suzuha said, shrugging and fiddling with one of the buttons inside what was allegedly her time machine. Well, it was Okabe's time machine according to Suzuha, but she was offering to use it to take them to Castle Caladan far faster than a thopter could have. "Either way, this is the only way you can get where you need to go in time to actually do anything."</p><p>Chani still didn't look convinced, but Irulan wasn't as willing to dismiss the claim of time travel, however implausible it might sound at first. She was reminded of the evidence that Suzuha's friend Mayuri could read Japanese, a long-dead language that no one alive aside from perhaps Paul should have been able to read. And she also couldn't forget about the shock on Paul's face when he first saw Suzuha, Mayuri and Okabe. He could see things no one else could. It took a lot to shock Paul, but recognizing three people as time travelers from the distant past might just do it.</p><p>"If you have a time machine, why haven't you returned to your own time where all your friends are?" Irulan asked, choosing to believe the woman's story for now while she sought more information.</p><p>"We can't," Suzuha said, shaking her head without looking up. "We're from a different timeline, and if we ran into the versions of ourselves from this timeline it would risk creating a paradox. We can go pretty much anywhere else <em>except</em> for to our own time, so we've been exploring space and time ever since."</p><p>"Then why have you stayed here?" Irulan asked. "This isn't exactly a time of great peace."</p><p>"We ran into some trouble when we were attacked by the Honored Matres on Seprek 5000 years in the future from this time," Suzuha said. "We escaped, but in the process the time machine got damaged. We're stranded here until Okabe can fix it."</p><p>"How are we going to travel anywhere in it if it's broken?" Chani asked skeptically.</p><p>"Time travel is currently impossible," Suzuha said. "But the machine can still travel across space near-instantaneously, so it'll get you to Castle Caladan quickly." She finally looked up and focused on Irulan and Chani, who were sitting side by side. "But before I do that I want your word that the Atreides family won't try to take the time machine off of me by force. Time travel is a dangerous thing to mess around with even if you know what you're doing. And this machine falling into the hands of someone with the powers of Paul Atreides would be a disaster. I'm willing to help you, but not if you can't promise me this."</p><p>Irulan looked at Chani, and she could see that the Fremen was still highly skeptical of some if not all of the things Suzuha was claiming. But Chani recognized the same thing Irulan did: the only chance they had of making it to Castle Caladan in time to possibly make a difference was if Suzuha was being honest with them, and she wasn't taking them anywhere without this promise."</p><p>"I promise," Irulan said. Suzuha nodded and then looked over at Chani, who nodded back.</p><p>"I promise too," Chani said. "No one will try to take your machine away from you."</p><p>Suzuha nodded. "Good. Then get ready to go. We've got enough room so you can bring a few of those Fedaykin soldiers with you too; might be a good idea."</p><p>"Yes, I think it might," Irulan said. Even if they cut down on their travel time by several hours, the need to use force was still very likely.</p><p>--</p><p>Paul led the way through the halls of Castle Caladan. It had been years since he'd called this place his home. So much had changed since then. He'd been a boy when he left, his father having been moved off of Caladan and assigned to Dune per the orders of Emperor Shaddam. His father had known it was a move meant to weaken him; it might as well have been a direct attack on his power. But he'd followed the directive anyway. Paul wondered what his father would think about the risk he was taking today.</p><p>Even with all the time that had passed, so much was instantly recognizable. He led Gurney and the Idaho ghola towards the old training room where they'd used to practice arms, feeling very nostalgic to be making the trip with his two former teachers.</p><p>But not everything was the same, of course. With every step they took and every person they encountered in the castle who felt off, Paul was reminded that this place was not the place he had left. This had been his home, but today it could very well become the place of his death. Though some of the staff was the same, he could recognize several of them as being replacements put there by the Tleilaxu. Each time he spotted one of them he was reminded of what he was walking into. There was no doubt that the Tleilaxu were going to mount an attack on him, here, today, soon. There was no avoiding that and no turning back from this course he'd chosen now. He could only hope that he would be able to reawaken Duncan's memories in time.</p><p>He smiled when they arrived at his intended destination. He pushed the door to the training room open and waited for Gurney and Hayt to join him inside. The ghola stepped in and looked around, studying the room curiously.</p><p>"Do you remember this room, Hayt?" he asked. "We trained in here. You taught me so much when I was a boy." He looked at Gurney briefly. "You both did. Duncan fought with finesse and grace, while Gurney was the more lethal of the two. I couldn't have asked for better trainers."</p><p>Gurney smiled slightly. "And we couldn't have asked for a better pupil."</p><p>"The room is familiar to me," the ghola said. "But I don't have any specific memories of it."</p><p>"You don't remember training me with the blade in here?" Paul pressed, turning to face him directly. "You can't remember a single thing you did when you were Duncan Idaho?  Not training me or sparring with me, or demonstrating with Gurney while I watched?" Hayt shook his head. "Not even giving your life to save mine, and my mother's? You can't remember that either?"</p><p>"I cannot," the ghola said, shaking his head.</p><p>Paul sighed. He decided now it was time to address the more unpleasant business. "I know that several of the regular staff of the castle have been replaced by face dancers," he said, looking straight at the ghola. "And I know that you, Hayt, told Scytale about my intentions to come here today."</p><p>Tears formed in the ghola's eyes, but Hayt nodded all the same. "I did," he said. "I had no choice. The Tleilaxu have means to extract information from me, regardless of my own wishes." Paul nodded sympathetically. "You should have listened to me when I told you to send me away. It would have been the only way to protect yourself from me, and from the Tleilaxu's hold over me."</p><p>If the ghola was expecting Paul to agree and walk away from him now, or perhaps even to exterminate him, Paul was going to disappoint him. Rather than moving away from Hayt or asking Gurney to protect him, he stepped closer to what had once been Duncan Idaho and placed an arm on his shoulder.</p><p>"I will extend the same courtesy to you as I once did to Thufir Hawat," Paul said. "In payment for his services to House Atreides, I allowed Hawat to ask anything of me at all, and if it was in my power to give it to him I would do so. I will make you the same offer now, because whether you remember your previous life or not, you're still Duncan Idaho. So I will do for you as I did for Thufir. Whatever you want from me, you may have. If what you want is to claim my life, you can have it."</p><p>"Paul!" Gurney objected, looking at him with alarm. Paul hadn't told Gurney or anyone else about exactly what he'd planned to offer the ghola today. As far as Gurney knew they were just coming here to try and restore Idaho's memories, but he didn't know just what Paul was prepared to do to try and make that happen.</p><p>"It will be fine, Gurney," Paul said. "This is my decision."</p><p>"I didn't come here to watch you die," Gurney said. Paul hadn't come here to die either, as it happened, but he knew that Gurney would not be convinced that this was anything other than a very bad idea. That was no matter though. He didn't need to win an argument with his old teacher. He just needed him to stand back and not interrupt what was about to happen, whatever that might be.</p><p>"You are not to interfere, Gurney," Paul said, and he spoke to him not as the boy who'd been his pupil, the boy who had been merely the son of his duke. He spoke to him not as Paul Atreides but as Muad'Dib, the emperor. Gurney grunted his displeasure, but Paul could tell that he wasn't going to interfere. That was good. The only hope of this working now was for Paul to show Duncan that he truly would place his life in his hands. Showing that level of trust and devotion would hopefully break through the Tleilaxu training, destroy the ghola weapon they'd created and bring out the man that Duncan Idaho had been.</p><p>"You may take whatever you would ask for as payment for your years of loyal service," Paul reiterated as he faced the ghola once again. "If what you want is to strike me down, you may do so now."</p><p>Paul could see that Hayt was in what appeared to be great pain. His face was anguished and spoke to tremendous conflict within him. He was torn on what he should do. Paul could feel it; the Tleilaxu training that urged him to kill Muad'Dib as he'd been ordered was warring with the instincts of Duncan Idaho, which were telling him that he was not to harm Paul Atreides, who he had trained, laughed with, looked after and laid his life down to protect. This was it. This was the opportunity Paul had been waiting for, and the opening he'd been willing to come here and risk it all to create.</p><p>“Free yourself, Duncan,” he said, stepping forward and looking at his old master imploringly. “Remember who you really are. The Sardaukar might have killed you, and the Tleilaxu might have brought you back and given you a different purpose, but neither of them can change who you are.” The long-held beliefs about all ghola said differently, but Duncan had already proven that he was unlike any other ghola that had come before him. Now he just needed to break through the Tleilaxu conditioning, defy his orders and remember his true self. He was so close to getting there, and Paul was betting his life that he could do so. Either the ghola Hayt became Duncan Idaho once more, or Paul lost his life in all likelihood.</p><p>“Remember,” Paul said. “Remember your years of loyal service to my father, Duke Leto. Remember all that you did for me. I wouldn’t be standing here today without your training and eventually your sacrifice, and that’s why I know that I can put my life in your hands just as I always have. Remember who you really are. You’re not Hayt, the ghola who does the bidding of his Tleilaxu masters. You’re Duncan Idaho, and Duncan Idaho would never hurt me.”</p><p>Paul watched him closely. He watched the conflict on Duncan’s face, and the longer the ghola went without acting the more certain Paul became that his plan was going to work. Clearly his instructions to eliminate him were compelling him to take Paul up on his offer and kill him, but that this much time had passed without him actually doing so spoke to him truly being different than any ghola that had come before. This was actually going to work. The ghola Hayt was about to give way to a reawakened Duncan Idaho.</p><p>“I am sorry,” the ghola said, and he truly did sound sorry. But that seemingly genuine sorrow did not stop him from stabbing Paul Atreides in the gut.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Awaken</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Irulan and Chani arrive at Castle Caladan, but are they too late?</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>No sex this time; pure plot and fighting here.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>Five Weeks Earlier</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Paul watched as men screamed, shouted and surged forward, feeling the taste of victory on their tongues. This was a battle of the distant past, and while the weaponry, the divisions and even the very planet was different, warfare was still strikingly familiar. How many times had his Fremen let out these same sorts of shouts as they prepared to crush the resistance of their enemies?</em>
</p><p>
  <em>If you were to add up the casualties from both sides somewhere in the range of a million soldiers had fallen during this long, drawn-out battle, he knew, and yet it had been long forgotten, lost to the passage of years to the point that he would get blank stares if he spoke to anyone he knew about World War I, Britain or Germany. But for these men, this was probably the most significant moment of their lives. After an artillery bombardment on the German lines, the British soldiers were currently going over the trenches of the Somme. They fell all around him, their lives cut short by German snipers and machine gun fire, and yet the push continued. History would have it that the Franco-British forces 'won' this battle, and yet their losses were higher than the German side. None of the dead on either side had a chance to care about the result of the battle.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>He narrowed his eyes when he saw another there with him, observing the battle. She was another much like him--an observer, not a participant. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>"You should not be here," he said as he cautiously approached the young, beautiful blonde woman. As he got closer, he could recognize her features even if he'd never seen her before. She looked very much like Irulan had in her late teen years, but unlike Paul's wife she had the blue in blue eyes so familiar among the Fremen. And though they were subtle, thanks to his access to memories and dreams of the past he could detect signs in her facial features that gave away her Atreides ancestry as well.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>This was his daughter, Chalice. This was his daughter with Irulan. She was in his Other Memory, but she seemed more interested in him than in the bloody battle.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>"I suppose you're wondering how we can both see each other, father?" Chalice asked, looking straight at him.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>"No, that's easy enough to figure out," he said. "I'm having a vision of your Other Memory, and you in turn are having an Other Memory of my vision."</em>
</p><p>
  <em>"Of course," she said, nodding.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>"And it's not hard to understand why you've reached out to me either," he continued. "You have an obvious motive for contacting me. You want to convince me to breed with your mother."</em>
</p><p>
  <em>"I don't think you need as much convincing as you might believe," she said. "If you weren't already seriously considering having children with my mother, the two of us wouldn't be able to communicate with each other like this right now." Paul said nothing, not having much of a counterargument for that point. "But no, I'm not here merely to convince you to breed with my mother. I'm here because the timeline has changed, and your actions must change with it."</em>
</p><p>
  <em>"Now this actually does require explanation," he said. "What has supposedly changed, and what must I do in response?"</em>
</p><p>
  <em>"The massacre on Seprek was not supposed to have happened, and it has set about a chain of events that also were not supposed to occur," his daughter said. "And because the timeline has shifted, it must now be you who initiates the Golden Path."</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Paul shook his head immediately. He needed no explanations on what she meant; he knew what the Golden Path was, and what it would require from him. "I cannot," he said firmly. But Chalice did not back down.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>"You must," she insisted. "Before the changes it was not your responsibility, but now it is. You and only you can bring about the Golden Path in this new timeline, and if you don't, humanity will be extinct within the next two thousand years."</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Two thousand years. An unfathomable stretch of time for the average human. But not for Paul Atreides, who could see into the past and relive events otherwise forgotten to time, and see the potential futures that could come about depending on what choices were made. For him, a millennium or two into the future wasn't so far off at all.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>And if his daughter was correct, all of humanity would cease to exist in that time frame unless he took it upon himself to bring about the Golden Path.</em>
</p><p>--</p><p>
  <em>Present Time</em>
</p><p>After Chani brought several capable Fremen into the time machine with them, Suzuha caused the vessel to materialize at Castle Caladan. Irulan, Chani and the Fremen didn't even have time to marvel at what they'd just experienced, because there was a reason they'd come to Paul's childhood home with such great haste. They hurried out of the time machine, hoping they weren't too late.</p><p>The first view they got was not an encouraging one for Irulan. Castle Caladan was in ruins; the fire and smoke seemed to be a pretty obvious indication that there had been an explosion of some sort. Were they too late after all?</p><p>"Let's search among the ruins for anyone who needs help," Chani said in a firm, no nonsense tone. But the tightness of her face showed Irulan that the same worries running through her mind were weighing on Paul's longtime Fremen lover who was now Irulan's lover as well.</p><p>Irulan wasn't sure whether she hoped to find Paul among the smoking ruins so they might be able to help him, or dreaded finding him there because they might find that he was already beyond their help. But dreading the outcome would do them no good, so she did her best to ignore her worries and searched quickly.</p><p>"There's someone here," one of Chani's Fremen called. Irulan's heart leapt into her throat, though she doubted it would actually be Paul as the man surely would have specified that. Unless his body was too damaged to be able to distinguish, of course, but that was too grim a thought to dwell on. She hurried over to see what had been found.</p><p>"I know you," she said in surprise to the man who was still breathing and conscious as a couple of the Fremen worked together to move the rubble off of him. She didn't know his name, but she recognized his face. "You're one of the Sardaukar officers. I saw you amongst Count Fenring's retinue." The man nodded, wincing as the rubble was shifted off of her. "What are you doing here?"</p><p>"I was sent by Count Fenring," he said. "I don't know all of the details, but he apparently struck some kind of deal with the emperor. The count sent a hundred of us here to Castle Caladan last night, and we were instructed to hide out amongst the underground chambers deep beneath the castle and stay there until either the Emperor left or fighting broke out."</p><p>"Why would Paul send you here?" she asked. "Why send the Sardaukar instead of his own Fedaykin?"</p><p>It wasn't the Sardaukar officer who answered her question, but Chani. "He obviously knew that he was walking into a trap, and he knew the Tleilaxu would be watching. They would have been far more likely to take notice of any Fedaykin that got sent across early. The Sardaukar would be easier to move covertly."</p><p>"That's correct," the officer confirmed. "The Emperor contacted us, so we left the underground vaults to join the fight. But we'd only just arrived to the fight between the Fedaykin and the Face Dancers when there was a huge explosion that destroyed the castle."</p><p>"I see," Irulan said faintly. So Paul had prepared a countermeasure against the trap by having his old enemies the Sardaukar waiting to join the fray. But could he have possibly expected the Tleilaxu to blow up the castle itself? That was a question that remained to be answered, and Irulan wasn't sure that she would like the answer once she learned it.</p><p>--</p><p>
  <em>Twenty Minutes Earlier</em>
</p><p>Gurney Halleck came rushing in after the Idaho ghola stabbed Paul in the gut, and Paul watched with distress as his two former teachers came to blows. Gurney had known about the arrangement with Count Fenring and the presence of his Sardaukar as backup, but nothing could have prepared him for watching his friend stab his duke.</p><p>"You must make your escape now, my lord," Gurney said, not looking Paul's way as he kept his eyes on the ghola who could apparently not overcome his conditioning after all.</p><p>"I can't do that," Paul said, shaking his head. He did not want to leave his old instructor and friend behind. He'd had to leave Idaho behind once, and he didn't want to do the same to Gurney if he could help it.</p><p>"You are in no state to fight right now," Gurney said bluntly. "You'd only be a liability to me in this fight. Go, now, while there's still time. You need to make your way to the rest of the Fedaykin, and trust in them to protect you until the Sardaukar make their way up from the vaults."</p><p>Paul was loath to leave without Gurney, but he was forced to admit that he was right. The stab had not quite been fatal, but it was still more than enough to weaken him significantly. He reluctantly left the ghola for Gurney to deal with and made his way down the corridor, holding his hand over his stab wound as he went. He heard fighting break out in the distance as the squad of Fedaykin he'd brought with him this morning met the face dancers. He hadn't brought enough Fedaykin to beat them back in order to try and throw the Tleilaxu off, but for it to work he now needed the Sardaukar to do their part.</p><p>He activated the radio he'd brought with him for just this purpose. "It's time," he said simply, knowing that the Sardaukar had been waiting on his signal and would act swiftly now. He'd given Fenring instructions on how to get his men beneath the castle in secrecy, and now it was time to make the most of his surprise and attempt to shift this battle.</p><p>He'd barely gotten his message off before a face dancer was coming at him with killing intent. It was fortunate that the face dancer happened to be alone, because in his weakened state Paul didn't know if he would have been able to deal with multiple assassins. He struggled to avoid the blade of even this lone face dancer, but Paul was able to dodge and parry until he buried his blade in the chest of the face dancer. He didn't linger long, and had only just started to stagger forward again when there was a massive boom. The explosion shook everything around Paul, and the floor collapsed beneath his feet.</p><p>--  </p><p>The explosion brought an end to the fighting between Gurney Halleck and Hayt as well. Rubble from the collapsing ceiling crashed down onto both of them, and the ghola pulled his way out and looked around cautiously, anticipating a blow from his opponent that never came. Hayt reached the conclusion that a Lasgun must have hit a shield, and the resulting nuclear fusion had destroyed the castle.</p><p>The ghola picked his way through the rubble, and there he discovered that Gurney Halleck would not be aiming any more blows at him. Halleck would not be fighting, laughing, crying or doing anything with him or anyone else ever again. His body had been crushed beneath the falling debris, and though his eyes were still open, this was clearly a mortal wound. The breaths Halleck was taking would soon be his last.</p><p>The sight of his old friend in such a state did what even the gambit of Paul Atreides could not. As Gurney Halleck lay dying, the ghola Hayt ceased to be and the flesh became Duncan Idaho once more.</p><p>"Gurney," he whispered. Halleck's eyes focused on him, and searched his face. "Gurney, it's me. It's Duncan." Despite the agony his body must be in, Gurney smiled. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry for attacking you, and for stabbing Paul."</p><p>Gurney shook his head as much as he was able, which wasn't much. "Nothing to apologize for. Glad you're back. I always had faith that you were still in there, old friend. Now you're back."</p><p>"Now I'm back," Duncan agreed. He was back, and Gurney was dying.</p><p>"It's up to you now, Duncan," Gurney said. "Protect Paul. Do your duty to House Atreides. Do what I can't anymore."</p><p>"I will," Duncan promised, nodding his head solemnly. "I will protect Paul. You have my word."</p><p>Gurney Halleck said no more, but he did with a smile on his face. Duncan Idaho closed his eyes and took a moment to grieve, but only a moment. He didn't have time for anything more, because his lord needed protecting. Paul was already wounded, by Duncan's own hand, before that explosion even happened. He refused to even consider the possibility that Paul could have been killed in the explosion, or that he had bled out or been struck down by another foe after Gurney covered his escape. There was no way Paul Atreides could be dead yet; Duncan wouldn't allow it.</p><p>He took one last look at his old friend, then got up and left to do his duty. Duncan Idaho was back, and he would do his duty as he had always done. He would kill the Tleilaxu, and he would save Paul Atreides.</p><p>--</p><p>Paul Atreides blinked his eyes open, finding himself trapped under some rubble which pinned his left leg to the ground beneath him. He crawled his way out, moving as fast as he could in case any enemies were nearby and looking to finish the job. He was still alive, at least for now, but now he had a crippled left leg to go along with the wound in his gut that Duncan--no, that Hayt--had left him with.</p><p>There were no face dancers in the immediate vicinity, and that was a fortunate thing for him. He would do his best to defend himself if necessary, but he was realistic enough to know that he would struggle to do so. He'd barely been able to handle a single face dancer when it was only his stab wound he had to worry about, but with the injured leg on top of it he would be hampered significantly. Even a single face dancer would make very quick work of him in this state. And even if he was fortunate enough to avoid the face dancers, he was going to need medical attention fairly soon.</p><p>Trying to take his mind off of his current dire circumstances and focus on anything other than his injured leg and the stab wound, he analyzed the explosion. The obvious conclusion was that a Lasgun beam had hit a shield, but he had a feeling it was no chance result. His belief was that the Tleilaxu were so desperate to kill him that they'd caused that explosion intentionally.</p><p>If they were so bent on killing him that they'd blown up the castle itself to do so, it went without saying that there would still be more Tleilaxu reinforcements nearby to make absolutely sure the job was done. That had already been a given, and since his gambit to hide the Sardaukar and bring them out as a secret weapon had failed, his chances of escaping death now looked very slim indeed. He'd always known that his death was a distinct possibility today, and though he'd done his best to avert it, not even he was all-knowing.</p><p>As he limped along as fast as he was able, he saw three thopters land amongst the ruins of the castle he had called home in his youth. Face dancers began to step out of them, and with each new face dancer that arrived Paul felt his chances of survival grow even slimmer.</p><p>--</p><p>As if searching amongst the rubble for Paul (hopefully still alive, though the odds of that became more remote with each passing minute) wasn't difficult enough, then Irulan, Chani and their Fremen entourage had to deal with the freshly arrived face dancers as well. They saw the thopters arrive and did their best to avoid the face dancers while continuing their search, not needing any more complications. As callous as Irulan felt to keep walking and ignore the fact that the newly arrived face dancer reinforcements were killing anyone they found in the rubble who happened to have survived the explosion, there was nothing that could be done for any of them right now. Her group couldn't fight them all, and if they failed to find and save Paul all of this would be pointless anyway. So she did her best to ignore the slaughter taking place all around her and focused on trying to avoid any direct confrontations with their enemies.</p><p>That wasn't to be, however. They circled around one group of them only to walk directly into a different group. Irulan and Chani fought hard, and the time traveler Suzuha was no stranger to combat, as she'd shown when she helped Irulan escape from Scytale. With their group of Fedaykin with them as well they were able to fend off the attack and kill the group of face dancers before any more could arrive.</p><p>The victory did not come without a cost, however. Irulan, Chani and Suzuha made it through the fight unharmed, but they lost four of the Fedaykin along the way, dropping their number down to eight. Any more battles with face dancers would be even more difficult now that their group was four Fedaykin smaller, which made it imperative to avoid open battle with any of them if at all possible.</p><p>"Do you still want to keep searching for him?" Suzuha asked. Irulan nearly snapped at her for even suggesting that she might want to give up the search, but bit it back. She realized that Suzuha was merely being practical and testing their resolve.</p><p>"Yes," Irulan said firmly. Chani nodded as well, as if the question wasn't even worth verbally responding to. They were seeing this through to the end; there was no question about it. One way or the other, they wouldn't stop until they found Paul.</p><p>--</p><p>Paul knew that his chances of evading the face dancers indefinitely were very small, especially once the three thopters touched down. There were a lot of them, and he couldn't move very fast in his current state. That's why he may have been disappointed when a squad of face dancers found him, but he was far from surprised. Luck would only hold out for so long.</p><p>He would've struggled to handle this many face dancers even when fully healthy, and in his current state he stood no chance. But he was also too hobbled to even think about trying to escape; he wouldn't have made it far at all before one of them killed him from behind. That wasn't how he was going to go out. If he was going to die today (and that seemed exceedingly likely at this point), he was going to do it with as much pride as he could muster. Maybe he could even score a lucky hit and take at least one more face dancer out with him.</p><p>They advanced on him as a group, but Paul stood his ground and held his blade at the ready, determined to go down fighting. He did land a blow on the first one that got close, though he doubted it would be a fatal wound. And there were still other face dancers to deal with; too many for him to deal with in his current state. He was disarmed before he could strike at any of the others, and he was rendered effectively helpless at that point. To his surprise, though, none of them moved to finish the job and kill him despite having an obvious opening to do so and do so easily. There could only be one reason for that. If they weren't killing him yet, it was because there was something they wanted to do with him first. That seemed like a mistake to Paul, but obviously they felt confident that their victory was assured at this point. And to be fair, they had good reason to feel that way.   </p><p>Another squad arrived at a signal, and then Paul understood what they'd been waiting for. "Welcome to my childhood home, Scytale," he called.</p><p>The face dancer laughed mockingly. "Thank you, dear Emperor," he said. "How ironic that your childhood home will also serve as the place where you die."</p><p>It did seem that way, though Paul wouldn't acknowledge it just yet. "I'm surprised to see you here. Aren't you supposed to be at the Landsraad meeting?'</p><p>"'Scytale' is at the meeting," Scytale said. "As you're well aware, we're capable of taking on the appearances of others. Another face dancer remained behind to take up my role at the Landsraad today, because I wanted to be here at Castle Caladan to make sure I took care of you personally."</p><p>As Paul thought, the only reason he wasn't already dead was because Scytale had given the other face dancers instructions to leave the killing blow for him. Regrettably, it seemed he was going to get to see his plan through to the end.</p><p>"I must commend you for that trick you tried to pull with the Sardaukar," Scytale said, continuing on without a response from Paul. "It was an inspired ploy, truly. But you underestimated what lengths we are willing to go to in order to see you dead. We used a Lasgun on one of our own shields just to bring you down. And now here we are."</p><p>"Here we are," Paul agreed.</p><p>"I see you've got quite a nasty stab wound there," Scytale said, not sounding the least bit surprised about it. "Did the ghola attack you?"</p><p>"Yes," Paul said, nodding. "It wasn't fatal though, even though he had every opportunity to ensure that it would be."</p><p>"Of course it wasn't fatal," Scytale said, sounding amused. "That was intentional. We believed that the task of dealing you a killing blow might actually awaken Duncan Idaho."</p><p>"So you thought it was possible?" Paul asked, legitimately curious. Maybe he hadn't been mistaken in thinking it could be done after all.</p><p>"It's never happened before, but yes," Scytale said. "If there was ever going to be a ghola not of Tleilaxu origin who could have possibly regained the memories of their previous life, Duncan Idaho might have been that special case. But we took the necessary precaution, and now you're here, wounded but not dead. Though that won't be the case much longer, I'm afraid."</p><p>"What exactly do you hope to achieve in killing me?" Paul asked. "My death won't bring the Jihad to an end. It will continue with or without me. If I'd thought my death might have ended it, we wouldn't be standing here talking. The Fremen will just turn me into a martyr, and nothing is more dangerous than a bloodthirsty group with a cause. And killing me won't give you my Empire either."</p><p>"I'm well aware that the Jihad won't end with you here today," Scytale said, unconcerned. "And I even believe that you're right about the Fremen becoming even more destructive and out of control once you're not there to pull them back even slightly. But we've accounted for that, and it will actually work in our favor. Short term brutality will lead to long term success for us. As the Fremen grow more vicious and unforgiving, the other Great Houses will finally turn against you completely. And once that's done, the Bene Tleilax will use the subsequent chaos as our opportunity to make our rise. Eventually we'll gain control of the Imperium itself, and then we'll finally bring the Great Belief to all of humanity."</p><p>This actually made a great deal of sense to Paul, and cleared up any lingering questions he might have had about the Tleilaxu's greater motivations. As he had suspected, the Tleilaxu followed a secret religion, Zensunni in nature, and their overarching goal was to spread it across all of civilization. This wasn't unlike what the Fremen wished to do, and as Paul could attest better than anyone else, a similar motivation had fuelled countless rebellions, invasions and wars over years, centuries and planets.</p><p>"I understand what you're trying to accomplish, but I don't think it's going to work out the way you hope it will," Paul said.</p><p>"Oh?" Scytale seemed surprised by this. "Do you honestly expect to stop me? Do you think you're going to get out of here alive?"</p><p>"That wasn't what I meant," he said, shaking his head. "My Empire is more than just me and the Fremen. Even with my death, I have confidence that my mother, Chani and Princess Irulan will be able to keep things together and stop you from getting what you're hoping for."</p><p>"Do you truly believe that?" Scytale said skeptically. "Are you trusting in blind faith like a common person, and ignoring all evidence to the contrary? Or are you relying on your prescient vision here? I'm honestly not sure which would be worse. You becoming someone who wishes for a miracle with all his heart would go against everything you've stood for up until now, but at least it would be understandable with your death closing in on you. But if your prescient vision has brought you to this conclusion, well, it hasn't done much good stopping the Tleilaxu so far, has it? Your prescience has brought you here, moments away from being killed in the ruins of the castle you once called home."</p><p>Paul tried to think of something else to say, instinctively understanding that when this conversation ended, his life would as well. But Scytale had clearly said all that they intended to say. The leader of the group turned to the face dancer closest to Paul and nodded.</p><p>"Kill him." The face dancer moved to comply, but before he could do so a knife flew through the air and buried itself in his chest. Scytale's head whipped in the direction that the knife had flown from, as did Paul's.</p><p>"You?!" Scytale hissed, shocked to see Irulan, Chani and a handful of Fedaykin there. Paul shared his surprise. He stared at the group in incomprehension. He'd seen multiple outcomes for how this day might turn in his prescient vision, but not once had he ever seen Irulan or Chani there, or make that here. He was astonished they were here, and couldn't understand how they could have possibly made it here this quickly.</p><p>But they were here, and there was nothing for it now. The talking and plotting was finished, and all that was left was the battle.</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan dodged a blow from a face dancer and launched her own counterattack. Her opponent parried one blow, but Irulan caught him with a knee to the stomach that weakened him enough for her to stab him in the face. No sooner had she done that than she pulled her blade out and whirled around to meet another opponent.</p><p>Their group was pushing back hard, and more than half of the assembled face dancers had been killed at this point. But Irulan and her group had been outnumbered more than three to one at the outset of the fight, and those were difficult numbers to overcome. One by one, all of the remaining Fedaykin had fallen. Suzuha had been a force, but eventually multiple face dancers worked together to disarm and restrain her. Out of the corner of her eye Irulan saw the Sardaukar officer that had come with them succumb to a slash to the neck.</p><p>Irulan didn't have time to mourn him or anyone else, because she had her hands full just trying to survive. She did battle with one face dancer, but the numbers caught up to her and she wasn't able to react in time to stop another face dancer from stabbing her in the thigh. She grunted in pain, and that pain increased when the original face dancer stabbed her below the collar bone.</p><p>Her head twisted to the side automatically when she heard a screech of pain, and despite her own predicament her heart went out to Chani when she saw the beautiful Fremen girl holding her hand up over the ruins of her left eye. Scytale laughed at the permanent damage he'd just done to Paul's lover, not that he intended for her or any of them to live long enough for their wounds to matter.</p><p>"I don't know how you managed to get here so quickly, but I'm glad you did," Scytale said, sounding truly joyous. "Since you're here, you've presented me with the perfect opportunity to do even more damage to the Atreides than I expected to be able to do today." He turned away from Chani and Irulan, disregarding them both entirely in favor of looking directly at Paul, who was hobbled, unarmed and defenseless.</p><p>"So much for your belief that your women would carry things on in your absence, mighty Muad'Dib," he mocked. "I'm going to kill both of them right in front of you. Then I'll kill you." Chani screamed and tried to reenter the fight despite her current state, but one of the face dancers grabbed her from behind and held her back so she couldn't get to Scytale. Irulan looked away, not wanting to face the damage that had been done to the woman who had recently become her lover. Her own wounds seemed insignificant in comparison, not that it mattered. The battle was lost, and all that was left was their deaths.</p><p>"The Lady Jessica and your younger sister will be all that's left after today, but they won't be able to hold back what's coming," Scytale said, looking at Paul. "Perhaps it will take some time for it to fall apart completely, but today is the day that your Empire starts to crumble around you. And it will start right now, with me killing your women right before I kill you."</p><p>Things had been looking grim for them for some time now, but it was only as Scytale turned back to regard her with blade in hand that the hopelessness truly overwhelmed her and caused her to feel dread. They'd come here hoping to find Paul, to stop the Tleilaxu from killing the Emperor, but they'd failed. Paul would soon be dead, and they would be too. He'd apparently thought that she and Chani and his mother would keep his empire from falling even after his death, but that wasn't going to happen now. They would die this day just as she would. Chani would die, and Irulan would die, and so would the unborn child growing within her. Maybe Paul had known about her pregnancy all along, and had come here today believing that his offspring would succeed him no matter what Scytale and the Tleilaxu did. But it wasn't going to happen now. All four of them would die in the ruins of Paul's childhood home, as would everyone else they'd brought with them.</p><p>--</p><p>The face dancer holding Chani let out a gurgling moan, and Paul looked over to see a blade buried in his chest. Holding the blade was the ghola named Hayt, though he pulled it out and swiftly turned to point it at Scytale instead.</p><p>"My name is Duncan Idaho," he said, "and I am here to save my Duke."</p><p>There was a fire, an intensity to his voice that had never been there since the ghola had first been gifted to Paul. This was the man he'd known; this was the man who had trained him, protected him, and given his life to protect Paul and his mother from the Sardaukar in the aftermath of Yueh's betrayal and the death of Paul's father Duke Leto. This was Duncan Idaho; this was the man Paul had been trying to revive. He was so overjoyed that he didn't fully take notice of the fact that Gurney wasn't with him, nor did he reflect on what that more than likely meant.</p><p>Shock was plain to see on Scytale's face, but it switched to a more interested curiosity after a few seconds. "You managed to regain your memories after all, even though the blow you inflicted on Paul Atreides was not fatal," the face dancer mused. "That's fascinating. Still, it makes no difference in the end. You're a skilled swordsman, Idaho, but take a look around you. There's no one else on your side capable of being any help in a fight right now, and too many of us still stand. You can't possibly hope to save Paul Atreides, not by yourself, not with this many of us left."</p><p>Paul wished that he could help in some way, or that <em>any </em>of them could, but Scytale was sadly correct in his assessment there. He was wounded, hobbled and unarmed, Chani was unarmed, in great pain and missing an eye, and Irulan was on her knees and suffering from multiple wounds. Suzuha would have been a great help, but she had multiple face dancers dedicated just to holding her down. None of them would be able to offer any challenge to a single face dancer currently, so Duncan would have to fight them all alone.</p><p>The first face dancer in his range was dispatched easily by Duncan, who drove his sword through his enemy almost before Paul could blink. Two more came at him, and Duncan opened up a huge gash in the chest of one that would kill him quickly. The other did manage to stab Duncan in the side, but the swordmaster barely seemed to feel it. The face dancer might have scored first blood on him, but when Duncan's sword came to bear it finished the fight in a single blow.</p><p>Duncan became a dealer of destruction from there on. Paul didn't think he'd ever seen him move with such speed, display such skill with the blade or wield such killing intent. Every step he took brought him closer to another enemy, and no face dancer survived for long once Duncan targeted them. This was the Duncan Idaho who had slain no less than nineteen elite Sardaukar soldiers before finally succumbing to his wounds and the overwhelming odds, all to give Paul and his mother the time to escape. Paul would have died that day if not for the valor, skill and deadly precision of Duncan Idaho, and the reawakened former ghola seemed determined to succeed despite astounding odds once again.</p><p>He wasn't invincible of course, and he was still just one man fighting many foes, all of them armed and all of them skilled. Duncan did not bring his enemies down effortlessly or without pain, as there were a number of wounds that he suffered in the process of his solo battle. Aside from that first blow to the side, he'd been stabbed in the leg while moving and in the arm which he'd used to shield his face while his sword was busy ending the life of another opponent, and there was also a nasty gash across his back that he'd suffered while fighting three opponents at once.</p><p>Yet despite all of his wounds and all of his opponents, Duncan was still standing. He killed the face dancers off one by one, and the odds which had once seemed so insurmountable improved with each dead opponent that piled up at the feet of this master swordsman. He worked his way closer and closer to Scytale with each dead face dancer, and Paul had spared a few brief glances at Scytale throughout Duncan's display. He had seemed supremely confident at the start of it, but had grown more worried the longer Duncan's killing spree continued.</p><p>Eventually all of the other face dancers were dead, and it was only Scytale that remained. He shook his head as if he couldn't believe what he'd seen. "Impossible!" the face dancer said.</p><p>"I will save my Duke," Duncan repeated, ignoring his wounds and advancing on the last remaining foe who stood between him and his goal. Scytale shook off his disbelief and prepared to defend himself. Clearly this hadn't gone as he'd expected it would, but from his perspective there was still a way to salvage it. If he could just defeat Duncan, he'd probably still be able to kill Paul afterwards, and Chani and Irulan too. But flight wasn't an option for him, nor for Duncan. One of them had to die so the other could do what they came here to do.</p><p>Duncan moved straight forward, heedless of the danger, and stabbed Scytale in the throat. Scytale's eyes bulged as the blade struck home, but he remained defiant to the end. The face dancer used the last of his strength to stab Idaho in the chest, and his blade stuck deep. The previous wounds Duncan had taken had been serious, but this one was much worse. Paul's heart leapt in his throat when he saw it.</p><p>Paul had been motionless and useless during the fight, but he managed to move his body over and clutch at Duncan as the man let his blade drop. Paul didn't even spare a glance at the corpse of Scytale. The face dancer's plot had failed in the end and he was now dead, but Paul wasn't concerned with him. The only reason he had failed, the only reason Paul, Irulan and Chani were still drawing breath was because of the skill and determination of Duncan Idaho, and it was Duncan who Paul was focused on right now. Paul felt his old swordmaster's blood dripping into his hands, and grit his teeth. For all his power, he could no more close this wound than he could stop his Fremen and their Jihad. He was an emperor and he possessed abilities beyond anyone and anything else, and yet he felt completely powerless.</p><p>"Gurney is dead," Duncan said after Paul reached him. Paul just nodded. He'd already known that to be true without having been told. There was no chance that Gurney wouldn't have been right there by Duncan's side fighting the face dancers if he was still alive. "It was my fault. He was crushed by the debris when the explosion happened. It took that for me to snap out of what they did to me and become myself again. But I'm glad that I at least managed to save you, my Duke."</p><p>"Hang in there, Duncan," Paul said, trying to stop his voice from trembling. "We're going to get you help. We're going to save you."</p><p>Duncan shook his head slightly, and it was like that was all he was capable of now. He'd looked liked such a force of nature while wiping out the face dancers, and yet now that the task was done he was weak and fading. "No," he said. "I know full well that I'm finished. This is the end for me. My second end, I suppose." He managed a weak chuckle. "Gurney's going to be jealous. I had the honor to die twice for the Atreides. No one else can ever say that."</p><p>"Neither will you," Paul said, shaking his head stubbornly. "You're not dying for me. Not again." Intellectually Paul knew that this wasn't the case. Duncan was right. He was dying, and for all his power Paul could do nothing to stop it. These weren't the words of the prescient emperor who some among his followers revered as a godlike figure. These were the words and hopes of Paul Atreides, who did not want to lose his teacher and his friend for a second time.</p><p>"Goodbye, my Duke," Duncan said. Then his eyes closed, never to open again. For the second time, Duncan Idaho had used skill and determination to defy tremendous odds and save his Duke's life. But also for the second time, he had subsequently succumbed to his injuries. For the second time, Duncan gave his life in service to the Atreides, and to Paul specifically.</p><p>Paul's eyes closed as well, and he shook his head. Scytale's plan had been foiled, but the cost had been far too great. Sardaukar and Fedaykin had lost their lives today, and while Paul would honor their sacrifices later he couldn't focus on them now. His Sihaya had lost an eye, his wife had suffered injuries the severity of which he didn't know yet, and he himself was wounded and hobbled, but even these were not at the forefront of his mind yet.</p><p>It was the deaths of the two men who had done so much for him since childhood, and who had served him faithfully until the very end, that hit Paul hardest now. Gurney and Duncan had returned to Castle Caladan with him, and though they'd succeeded in keeping him alive, they'd died in his stead. Gurney would never play his baliset again, and Duncan had only been able to return to himself and remember who he truly was for a matter of minutes before his life ended once again.</p><p>Paul's eyes opened once again, but it wasn't because he'd gotten his emotions in check. He was overcome by grief and loss, and there was only one way for him to express that.</p><p>Fremen did not cry often. It was deeply ingrained in their culture, back from the days when they could not spare a drop of moisture, back before Paul had changed things on Dune. Paul had adapted to the Fremen lifestyle; he'd become Fremen, and that was why they'd followed him in the first place. But there, at Castle Caladan, Paul Atreides gave water to the dead.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. Goodbye and Hello</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>After returning from Castle Caladan, the Emperor concludes arrangements, says goodbye to dear friends and has an overdue conversation with the women in his life.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“How are your wounds, Emperor Atreides?”</p><p>“Healing,” Paul said simply, nodding at Count Fenring. It had been three days since the attack at Castle Caladan, and though Paul was still in pain he was on the road to recovery. Truthfully the emotional scars from the losses he’d suffered weighed on him far more than the temporary damage that had been done to his body by the Tleilaxu. “Thank you for joining me, Count Fenring.”</p><p>“Thank you for meeting with me,” the count said in return, speaking without any hint of the speech impediment he usually displayed in public. “I understand this is a tough time for you, but as you know, the wider universe will not wait.”</p><p>“No it won’t,” Paul said stoically. He understood that better than perhaps anyone who had ever lived. The session of the Landsraad had been suspended once the Tleilaxu’s second assassination attempt on him came to light. All of the Great Houses now accepted and acknowledged that the Tleilaxu Council of Masters had been responsible for both the attack on Castle Caladan and the previous attempt on the lives of he and Irulan in Sietch Ashar back on Arrakis. The Landsraad now fully expected him to declare open war on the Bene Tleilax. No doubt everyone was maneuvering and plotting even as they waited for him to act.</p><p>“I must say, I find it very intriguing that the Duncan Idaho ghola managed to recover his memories,” Fenring said after a pause while he clearly tried to decide where to begin.</p><p>Paul nodded. “I am unbelievably fortunate that he did,” he said. “So is all of House Atreides. My family owes Duncan Idaho so much. I shall never let any Atreides forget that, no matter how many years pass.”</p><p>“Yes, even House Corrino is well aware of how good a swordsman Duncan Idaho was,” Fenring said. “He gave our own Sardaukar a painful lesson in his skill and strength back on Arrakis.”</p><p>“Yes he did,” Paul said, nodding numbly as he thought back to Idaho laying down his life to give Paul and his mother time to escape from capture and execution by Emperor Shaddam’s elite Sardaukar forces years earlier. That was the first time Idaho had committed an act of heroism and sacrifice for which Paul would never be able to repay him. Then he went and did it again just three days ago. And this time there would be no revival, no return as a ghola.</p><p>“I am sorry for your loss,” Fenring said softly. “Or losses, I should say. Idaho dying only minutes after regaining his memories would have been tragic enough on its own, but you lost Gurney Halleck as well. I am sure that loss has weighed on you as well as the Lady Jessica.”</p><p>“It has,” Paul agreed. He didn’t think Fenring was trying to deliberately upset him, but him alluding to the fact that his mother and Halleck had been lovers in recent years reminded Paul of just how angry she was with him. She had a right to be, to be fair. He’d lost two trusted friends and mentors at Castle Caladan, but she’d lost the man who had offered her companionship in the years after her beloved duke had died. And his death was Paul’s responsibility as surely as Idaho’s was.</p><p>“I do not mean to sound crass or insensitive, my dear emperor, but I feel compelled to point out that it wasn’t just Idaho and Gurney who perished at Castle Caladan,” Fenring said. “I sent one hundred of our Sardaukar to Castle Caladan to aid you as part of our agreement, and only two survived.”</p><p>“Yes,” Paul said with a frown. He wouldn’t pretend that he would mourn the Sardaukar like he had and would continue to grieve for Duncan and Gurney, but they were still more losses on their side. “I did not anticipate the Tleilaxu being willing to blow themselves up just to try and kill me. I apologize for my oversight, and for the losses it caused you. But the agreement that we reached in regards to the CHOAM company holdings should more than adequately compensate House Corrino.”</p><p>The count nodded. “Indeed. We should conclude our agreement now then. One hundred Sardaukar soldiers were lent to House Atreides in exchange for the return of 5% of House Corrino’s previous CHOAM holdings.”</p><p>“Yes,” Paul acknowledged. It was only a small portion of what House Corrino used to possess, but even 5% of what they used to have before their failed war with him was still a significant amount of wealth. “While I wish the cost in blood had been less for both our sakes, I am happy to honor our business agreement.” He looked at Stilgar standing next to him silently. “Stilgar, please bring me the relevant documents so I can transfer those holdings to House Corrino officially.”</p><p>His loyal Fremen confidant went and brought over the papers, and Paul flipped through and signed his name where necessary before passing them over for Count Fenring’s inspection. The count looked through them quickly before nodding.</p><p>“Shaddam will be happy with getting at least this much of the previous holdings back,” he said. Then, after a pause, his eyes flicked back up to Paul briefly. “It was indeed fortunate that Idaho’s memories awakened, but even more fortunate that your wife the Princess Irulan and your Fremen concubine Chani made it to Castle Caladan so quickly. I understand they used some sort of experimental aircraft?”</p><p>“That’s correct,” Paul said, confirming the public story they’d gone with. He could tell that Fenring was fishing for more, but Paul would betray nothing. “They borrowed it from a researcher from Richese. He’s quite a mad genius, I’m given to understand.” The time traveler Suzuha, who had gotten the four of them back to Castle Caladan via her time machine once she’d been freed of her restraints, had been clear about heavily restricting who knew about the time machine. Aside from he and his lovers, only Stilgar, Paul’s sister Alia and mother Jessica knew the truth. No others did, and no others would.</p><p>“Ah.” Fenring nodded. It was obvious that he didn’t fully buy it, but it had to be equally obvious to the shrewd count that Paul would say no more, and so he let the matter drop. “Well, we can just be glad they arrived. Otherwise you would have perished, the Tleilaxu would have gotten what they wanted, we would have been unable to recover our CHOAM holdings and all of our losses would have been for nothing. Like you, I regret that we lost so many men thanks to the rashness of the Tleilaxu, but at least we were able to conclude our business. And now that said business is concluded, I must say my goodbyes. My lovely wife Lady Margot and I must prepare to depart Caladan and return to Salusa Secundus.”</p><p>“Before you leave, I thought you might wish to know that Irulan is pregnant with my son,” Paul said. That stopped Fenring where he stood, and the count looked legitimately surprised, which was not an expression Paul had seen on his face often. “I intend for him to be my heir.”</p><p>“Her father will be very pleased to hear this,” Fenring said. Naturally he would; it meant that the blood of House Corrino would return to the throne, even if the future emperor himself would be an Atreides. Paul wasn’t concerned about that anymore though. Irulan might be Shaddam’s daughter, but she would never betray Paul or prioritize her old family over her new one. If there had been any reason left to doubt that, she’d more than wiped any doubts away with her actions at Castle Caladan.</p><p>“Before you commit to leaving, perhaps you’d be interested in discussing something else,” Paul said. “As you have pointed out, the universe will not wait. With Gurney’s unfortunate death, I am in need of a capable strategist to replace him, especially since we will likely be at war with the Tleilaxu soon.” And he didn’t expect Gurney to be the only advisor he lost. Unless he was mistaken, he believed his mother was going to make a request of him before he left Caladan, and he was not currently in any position to refuse her. He expected to be short another council member before he returned to Arrakis.</p><p>“And you expect me to fill his place?” Count Fenring asked.</p><p>“I do,” Paul said, nodding.</p><p>“While I am flattered by your offer, I find my time on Salusa Secundus rather relaxing these days, without the pressures of aiding an emperor,” the count said. Paul shook his head with a smile.</p><p>“You’ve said that before,” Paul said. “I’m not convinced that you’re as content with exile as you claim to be. Just give it some thought, Count Fenring. I don’t need an immediate answer from you, but I want you to at least consider it. And if you do decide to accept my offer, I’d like to request that you bring my wife’s sisters Josifa and Rugi to court with you.</p><p>Fenring nodded slowly. “I’ll think the matter over, and consult with Shaddam about it.”</p><p>Paul could tell that was as good an answer as he was going to get right now. “Thank you. That’s all I ask.”</p><p>“Again, I am flattered you would request my help,” Fenring said, “and I promise to give the offer the consideration it deserves. But as for now, I really must be going. My wife and daughter are expecting me.”</p><p>“Of course, count,” Paul said. “Thank you for your time.”</p><p>Fenring bowed to both him and Stilgar, then took his leave. Paul watched him go, but he wasn’t gone for long before Stilgar spoke up. The man had kept his silence throughout his meeting with Fenring as Paul had requested, but now that it was just the two of them he was going to make his opinions known.</p><p>“Do you think it wise to invite that man onto your council?” Stilgar asked. “I know you’re married to Shaddam’s daughter, but House Corrino is no ally of you or your family. You know Shaddam wishes to recover the throne.”</p><p>“And Count Fenring is his best friend,” Paul said, nodding. “Likely his only true friend at that. I understand your concern, Stilgar, but Shaddam Corrino is a busted flush.” Stilgar looked at him blankly, and Paul chuckled. “He has no hope of recovering the throne. Count Fenring knows that, and by this point even Shaddam may have accepted it.</p><p>“If Fenring wants to see an emperor of Corrino blood on the throne again he has two choices: my son with Irulan or his other daughter Wensicia’s son Farad’n. It might be true that Shaddam would prefer to see Wensicia’s son on the throne, as he would have to take the Corrino name to do so, but I don’t believe that Fenring thinks very highly of Wensicia. That’s why the count will accept my offer. And in doing so, and bringing Josifa and Rugi to court with him instead of Shaddam marrying them off to strategic allies to strengthen House Corrino, he’ll weaken the remaining Corrino threat to Atreides rule.”</p><p>“So Count Fenring himself is just a tool?” Stilgar asked. “A means to an end?”</p><p>“I won’t deny the political convenience of it, but that’s not all,” Paul said, shaking his head. “Count Fenring also has my respect. He’ll be a useful asset for everything that’s to come.”</p><p>“I still have my doubts about him,” Stilgar said bluntly. “But I will put my trust in Usul to know what is best.”</p><p>Paul smiled slightly. “Thank you for your trust, Stilgar.” His smile quickly dimmed as he thought about what he still had to do. “Now you can let my mother know that I have time to meet with her now.”</p><p>--      </p><p>The Lady Jessica entered Paul’s chambers for their second conversation since he’d returned from Castle Caladan, and he could see from the stiffness of her posture that she was still quite angry with him for his decision and what it had wrought.</p><p>“Go ahead,” he said, nodding at her slightly. “We’re alone, so you may speak freely.”</p><p>“It was reckless and stupid for you to confront the Tleilaxu at Castle Caladan, knowing you were walking into a trap,” she said. “That recklessness got Gurney killed, it caused Chani permanent blindness in one eye, and it led to Castle Caladan, your childhood home, getting destroyed.”</p><p>“It did,” Paul agreed calmly, nodding. He felt like he was a little boy again rather than an emperor; a little unruly boy being scolded by his mother. But he was no boy, and his actions and decisions had caused plenty of pain for plenty of people.</p><p>“It was a foolish plan,” she went on as if he hadn’t spoken at all. “You are only alive because Duncan managed to recover his memories despite the Tleilaxu’s best efforts, and also because Irulan and Chani arrived in a time machine of all things. And even then they were nearly too late.”</p><p>“All of this is true,” he said. He’d resolved to sit there and take it, to let her get it all off of her chest. But she sighed and shook her head, her anger seeming to dissipate if only slightly.</p><p>“Nevertheless, it wasn’t just your fault,” she said. “I hold myself partially responsible too. I knew you were making a mistake, but I should have done more to try and stop you from going there to begin with.”</p><p>“You can hardly blame yourself for that,” he said. “You wouldn’t have been able to stop me, and we both know it. My mind was made up.”</p><p>She looked at him, and the boy inside him ached to see his mother in such pain. “I have no doubt that Irulan and Chani will forgive you instantly,” she said. “I cannot do that. I will need more time before I can honestly tell you that I have forgiven you for your actions, and the consequences they brought upon us all.”</p><p>“I understand,” he said. “I wish that things at Castle Caladan had gone differently, and I will always wish that Gurney, Duncan and the others had not lost their lives that day. But I do not intend to let their deaths have been in vain. I hope to bring about a more peaceful future now as a result of this. The Imperium will now stand united against the Tleilax. And as a result of all of this I may also be able to bring an end to the Jihad sooner than I had previously foreseen.”</p><p>Jessica couldn’t hide her skepticism about that, nor did she try to, but she nodded all the same. “I hope you are right,” she said. “The losses can never be replaced, but if you can truly accomplish what you hope to, perhaps Gurney and Duncan will rest easier.”</p><p>There was an awkward silence at that, as they both reflected on what they’d lost and the price that had been paid at Castle Caladan. Paul had lost two of his dearest friends and mentors, she had lost her lover, and they had also suffered at least a temporary fracture in their familial relationship. Perhaps it would be repaired with time, but Paul suspected that it would be slow in coming.</p><p>His mother steeled herself and exerted control over her expression, and he could see her preparing to switch to another topic. He had a feeling he knew what she was about to ask; he’d been preparing for it already.</p><p>“I want Alia to stay here with me on Caladan,” she said, exactly as he’d expected. “It was foolish of me to let her stay on Arrakis after I returned here to Caladan. I should have brought her with me then, and I fear the influence that court has had on her. I am concerned about her wellbeing.” Paul knew what she was saying without actually saying. She was referring to the Bene Gesserit belief about Alia being an abomination, though she refrained from coming out and saying it.</p><p>“Stilgar has also informed me that you have already arranged for a replacement for her on the council in Count Fenring,” she continued, moving away from the delicate subject of abominations and into the more practical matters. “So I want her to leave your council immediately, and remain here with me when you depart Caladan after the funerals for Gurney and Duncan.”</p><p>“I agree,” Paul said, though not without some reluctance. “Alia staying here with you, and away from court, for a few years might be good for her.” He also believed that his mother would be in need of company here now that Gurney was gone, though he didn’t say that. There was no sense in picking at that raw wound. “I agree to your request. Alia will stay here.”</p><p>Jessica nodded, and the conversation ended quickly thereafter. Now that they’d addressed the things that needed to be addressed, she wasn’t really eager to be in his company and he did not consider trying to find some way to prolong the conversation. Mere words were not going to do any good right now. The only thing that might repair his relationship with his mother would be the passage of time, and perhaps her seeing the good that he accomplished going forward.</p><p>He signed and sat down heavily after she was gone. It had gone more or less as he had expected it to, and yet the conversation had still been trying. Still, as he and Fenring had discussed, the universe would not wait, nor would the people in it. There were people close to him, people who he wished to see. He called Stilgar back into the room, and looked up at his former Naib.</p><p>“Stilgar, would you inform Chani and Irulan that I want to speak to them tomorrow in my chambers, after the funerals are finished?”</p><p>--</p><p>“Many people expect an emperor to be some all-powerful or all-knowing figure,” Paul Atreides said as he stood on the grounds of the summer palace on Caladan and looked out at his attentive audience. Irulan was his wife, and yet she was as captivated by his words as everyone else as he delivered a speech in honor of the two men who had once taught him, and who more recently had given their lives in his service at Castle Caladan just four days ago. The castle itself would have been a more fitting location for this service, but obviously the castle had been destroyed in the attack and so they had gathered here instead. Irulan stood beside Chani on her left, with her sisters Josifa and Rugi on her right, and hung on every word that he said.</p><p>“But an emperor is still human; even an emperor has mentors who work hard to make him into a man worthy of sitting on a throne, and even an emperor must turn to trusted friends and loyal allies to help him with his burden. Gurney Halleck and Duncan Idaho fulfilled both of those roles for me, and I could have asked for no wiser mentors or two truer allies. I grieve for them, and I <em>will </em>avenge them. I ask all the Great Houses to support me in this, and I know that if we can unite justice will be swift, and peace will come that much more quickly.”</p><p>--</p><p>While others who had known them better stepped forward to pay their respects to the departed, Irulan hung back and spoke with her two sisters. Josifa was reminiscing about the time when Wensicia had paraded around in one of Irulan’s gowns in her youth and pretended she was her, and Irulan smiled gently. She couldn’t fully join in their lighthearted conversation, but she was glad they were in good spirits. Being around her sisters was good for Irulan right now; it kept her from some of the darker thoughts she’d tried to shake off over the last four days after her harrowing experience at Castle Caladan.</p><p>“I’ll miss seeing you two,” she said, smiling at them. She had had very little communication with them since her marriage to Paul, and having them with her here on Caladan had been a wonderful treat amidst everything else that was going on.</p><p>Rugi gave her a little smirk. “You might not be missing us for long,” she said.</p><p>Irulan cocked her head in confusion. “What do you mean? Aren’t you going back to Salusa Secundus with Count Fenring and his family tomorrow?”</p><p>“Yeah, we are,” Rugi said. “But haven’t you heard? Your husband has asked Count Fenring to join his council, and to bring us with him to Arrakis if he does.”</p><p>Irulan’s eyes widened. “No, I hadn’t heard that!” She hadn’t spoken to Paul at any great length since the confrontation with the Tleilaxu, so there had been no chance to talk about things like that. “It would be wonderful if you could be at court with me!” She’d felt so isolated for so long, and even though she now had a closeness with Chani that she’d never had before, having her sisters there with her as well would be lovely.</p><p>While Irulan's emotions were still in turmoil after what had happened at Castle Caladan, she felt lighter and more optimistic for the future as she chatted with her sisters now. She'd been expecting to say goodbye to them tomorrow and not see them again for a very long time, but should Count Fenring accept Paul's offer it seemed that they might be a regular presence in her life going forward. It wouldn't solve all of her problems, but it was an exciting prospect for a woman who had spent years feeling totally alone.</p><p>"Princess?" Irulan looked up to see Stilgar standing in front of her. "Usul wishes to speak to you now."</p><p>She looked up at the spot Paul had stood in earlier while he was making his speech, and where Chani had stood beside her earlier. Paul had left some time ago, and Chani had gone to speak with some of her Fremen associates earlier but Irulan saw no sign of her now either.</p><p>"Okay," she said, nodding at Stilgar before she turned to her sisters. "I'll talk to you two later, okay?"</p><p>Her sisters waved goodbye and wished her well as she followed Stilgar out of the large area everyone had gathered in. He led her through the summer palace, which was mostly empty at the moment, until they reached an antechamber outside of the chambers Irulan knew to be Paul's. But the antechamber wasn't empty, and Irulan apparently wasn't the only woman Paul wanted to speak with.</p><p>"Chani!" Irulan said, stepping up to give the other woman a hug. They hadn't spoken much during the service, but this wasn't the first time they'd met up since returning from Castle Caladan and the confrontation with the Tleilaxu. There had been no opportunity for her to speak with Paul at any length, but she'd been able to meet with Chani a few times. That didn't make Irulan any less eager to pull her Fremen lover into a hug. She'd only just found this level of closeness with Paul's longtime concubine, and she'd almost lost her four days ago. Hugging her was a way to remind herself that Chani had survived and was here with her.</p><p>Chani's own arms hugged her back and squeezed her tight, so maybe she felt the same way. When they broke apart Chani turned her head slightly, and Irulan could see the black patch over where her left eye had previously been. She had refused any suggestion of taking a Tleilaxu-crafted replacement eye, for obvious reasons. In Irulan's opinion she looked as pretty as ever despite the injury, and if anything the patch over her eye gave her a hint of danger and strength. It also served as proof that she had gone there, she had fought to save the man she loved, and though she had been wounded in the process she had succeeded. Even if it had been Duncan Idaho who had delivered the final blows and finished the job with his heroism, none of it would have been possible without the efforts of Chani, and of Irulan too.</p><p>"Are you feeling okay?" Irulan asked, giving her a once-over. Chani had been more seriously hurt out of the two of them, and even though she was standing here (and even though Irulan was well aware of her strength), she couldn't help but fret over her after how close she'd come to losing her.</p><p>"I'm fine," Chani said, nodding. "And you?"</p><p>"Just fine," Irulan said, shrugging. Irulan herself had been treated by a Suk doctor immediately upon their return from Castle Caladan in Suzuha's time machine. Her wounds were healing quickly thanks to the treatment, but she did still have a numb pain below her collar bone. Still, it was a small price to pay for what they'd achieved.</p><p>"Have you had a chance to speak to Paul before now?" Irulan asked while Stilgar checked inside to make sure Paul was ready to receive them. Chani shook her head.</p><p>"No more than you have," the redheaded Fremen woman said. "He's been so busy dealing with the fallout from the attack that we've barely spoken more than a few words to each other."</p><p>"And now he wants to speak to us both together," Irulan said curiously. It wasn't like the relationships between them had been any secret, but they had generally been separate things, Paul with Chani, Paul with Irulan and more recently Irulan and Chani with each other. Even though they all had a good idea of where things stood and what was happening (or at least they had until Paul's blowup with Irulan), it was rare for all three of them to discuss it together. She wondered what that meant.</p><p>Having been given the okay by Paul, Stilgar opened the door to Paul's chambers and led them inside. Paul was not alone in the room when they arrived. In the time since he'd left the service he had apparently been speaking privately with Suzuha, who was just getting up from her chair now. She nodded at Irulan and Chani on her way out the door, and Irulan muttered a farewell at her. She barely knew the brunette time traveler, but she would always feel indebted to her for what she'd done. They would never have made it to Castle Caladan in time without her help and the use of her time machine.</p><p>"Stilgar, would you tell Harah to bring us some spice coffee?" Paul asked as Stilgar escorted Suzuha out. As the other two left, Paul looked at Irulan and Chani and smiled. He looked weary and exhausted, but the smile at least seemed genuine. "Thank you for coming."</p><p>"As if we would refuse, Usul," Chani said lightly, making him smile a little wider.</p><p>"She's right," Irulan agreed. "I know you've been really busy, but we've still been waiting for days to speak to you. <em>Really </em>speak to you, I mean."</p><p>"I know you have," Paul said, nodding. "As I've been reminded several times over the last few days, the universe will not wait, nor will it give me time to shirk my responsibilities. But I'm here with you now."</p><p>Harah entered with the spice coffee, and Irulan watched curiously as the Fremen woman served all three of them. Maybe it was just Irulan's imagination, but Harah seemed far less hostile towards her than she'd been before. Perhaps that was because she could in no way be considered competition with Chani for Paul's affections anymore?</p><p>"I hope we didn't interrupt anything with Suzuha," Irulan asked once Harah was gone. She knew that the number of people who would be allowed to hear anything about this particular topic was going to be strictly limited, as it should be.</p><p>"No, we were finished," Paul said, shaking his head and taking a small sip of his coffee.</p><p>"Do you mind if I ask what you were talking to her about?" Irulan continued. Then, after drinking from her coffee, she decided to be more blunt. "Or more to the point, do you mind if I ask whether you're going to honor the promise Chani and I made to her, about not taking the time machine away from her and her companions?"</p><p>Paul smiled slightly. "Given what I saw of Suzuha's fighting ability, I doubt she would have left her so calmly if I'd given any hint that I wouldn't honor your deal. But no, I will not attempt to take possession of their time machine. I know better than perhaps anyone who has ever lived about the dangers of interfering with history." He paused and stared off into the distance thoughtfully for a moment before shrugging. "Well, perhaps Suzuha and her companions understand it even better than I do. I've seen distant pasts and potential futures, but not even I have physically moved through time."</p><p>Many people would be tempted by the usefulness of a time machine, Irulan knew. She could imagine her father wanting to use such a device to avert his defeat at Paul's hands and the end of the Corrino dynasty after thousands of years of rule. Irulan could even see herself being tempted to try and go back and save her mother's life, or her sister Chalice's, had she not sworn to Suzuha. But she could tell that Paul did not feel that tug. There was no temptation in his eyes at the things he might be able to do with a functional time machine, whether it be going back a few days saving the lives of Gurney Halleck and Duncan Idaho, or preventing the Jihad from ever starting, or even going back farther and stopping his father Duke Leto from being killed.                                                                                                   </p><p>"I spoke with Suzuha because I wanted to reassure her that her secrets were safe with us," Paul said. "I also wanted to offer to bring her and her companions into the employ of House Atreides while this Okabe works on fixing his time machine. She still has to run it by him, but I see no reason why they wouldn't accept."</p><p>"So they'll be coming back to Arrakis with us?" Chani asked.</p><p>Paul shook his head. "No. There would be too many eyes on them there. They'll remain here on Caladan with my mother and Alia. I've also arranged for my mother to give Suzuha some Bene Gesserit training." His mother obviously saw the wisdom in having someone as strong as Suzuha around on Caladan while they worked on their machine, so there had been no difficulty in getting her to agree to that.</p><p>"What was this about Alia?" Chani asked. "You said she's remaining here?"</p><p>"Yes," Paul confirmed. "My mother requested that my sister remain here with her on Caladan, so she'll be leaving my council. But Count Fenring will be joining to help fill the void left by her and Gurney." He looked over at Irulan. "And if you haven't heard, Josifa and Rugi will be coming with him to Arrakeen."</p><p>Irulan smiled. "They mentioned that might be happening." It was nice to hear confirmation from him though, and whether Count Fenring had officially told him or not, he seemed to consider it a done deal.</p><p>"I'm sure you have many questions for me," Paul said. Chani snorted as if that was so obvious it didn't even need to be said, and Irulan smiled and nodded. "But I think I'd better begin with what happened at Castle Caladan, and what exactly I was trying to achieve."</p><p>"That would be best," Irulan said. Him thinking it was in any way a good idea to knowingly walk into that trap was something she still couldn't wrap her head around. Not even he could have foreseen them arriving in a time machine, and without that happening everything would have failed.</p><p>"I had a vision two nights before I went to Castle Caladan," he began. "The vision showed me that by going there I could flush out the Tleilaxu conspiracy, defeat them and help Duncan break through his conditioning and regain his memories in the process." Irulan supposed all of those things had happened, though not in the way he might have hoped.</p><p>"To do what I could to try and make sure the plan succeeded, I made a deal with Count Fenring. I returned a small portion of House Corrino's old CHOAM holdings to them, and in return he sent one hundred Sardaukar to Castle Caladan in secret the night before. I knew that the Tleilaxu would be very wary and watchful for any Fedaykin arriving at the castle, whether they'd had an infiltrator amongst the Fedaykin to tip them off or not. But the Sardaukar wouldn't be expected. Unfortunately it did not go as I intended. I did not anticipate the face dancers being willing to blow themselves up in order to kill off the brunt of the Sardaukar forces Count Fenring lent to me.</p><p>"And while my vision did technically prove to be correct as far as defeating the Tleilaxu conspiracy and allowing Duncan Idaho to reemerge from the ghola Hayt, I did not foresee Duncan dying minutes after his memories returned. I also never expected Gurney to die as well. My plan may have succeeded in accomplishing all that my vision told me it would, but it didn't happen like I thought and hoped it would."</p><p>"So that's why you went through with this," Chani stated, nodding. "Fine. But why didn't you tell us about this before you carried it out?" Irulan nodded; this was the question she wanted an answer to as well.</p><p>"Because I believed you would try to stop me," he said, "and I don't think I'm wrong about that, am I?" Chani said nothing, and Irulan could only shrug helplessly. She couldn't say for sure how she would have reacted because she hadn't been given that choice, but realistically he was probably correct. "Aside from that, I knew that if you couldn't talk me out of it you would insist on trying to help me, and I didn't want that. I was concerned about your well-being should you know about or get involved in my plan."</p><p>"And we got involved in it anyway," Irulan said. Paul smiled ruefully, but he could say nothing against it. He would have died if they hadn't learned what he was up to and used Suzuha's time machine to get there in time to get involved, and they all knew it.</p><p>"My mother did know of the plan, and she tried to warn me not to go through with it," Paul said. "I didn't listen to her, and I wouldn't have listened to either of you had you known, though I regret it. I regret not telling either of you about what I was planning."</p><p>"It was foolish not to talk to us about any of this and acting on your own," Chani said, not mincing her words at all. But she smiled slightly anyway. "But I understand why you did it, and I forgive you, Usul." Paul smiled and nodded gratefully. Irulan had a feeling the patch Chani wore over what used to be her eye would always serve as a reminder to Paul of his folly, but hearing his lover tell him she forgave him looked to be a weight off of his shoulders.</p><p>"I do too," Irulan chimed in. Paul turned his head to look at her, and she smiled encouragingly. "You're right that I would have tried to talk you out of it, but next time <em>tell us </em>before you run off to do something like this, okay?"</p><p>"I will try not to knowingly walk into any enemy traps in the future, but point taken," Paul said. He suddenly sat up straighter in his chair and looked at Irulan seriously. "My mother wasn't the only one who tried to warn me that it was a bad idea to confront the Tleilaxu at Castle Caladan. Chalice did too."</p><p>"Chalice?" Irulan repeated, eyes widening. "And who is Chalice? Surely you're not trying to tell me you spoke to my dead sister."</p><p>"No, not her," Paul said, shaking his head. "Chalice is our future child, though not the one you currently carry."</p><p>"You've spoken to her," Irulan mumbled faintly. "To our future unborn daughter."</p><p>"Yes," Paul said, nodding seriously. "I've spoken to her a few times."</p><p>"How?" Chani asked simply.</p><p>"My prescience met her Other Memory," he said. When they just stared at him blankly, he went into greater detail. "I had visions of her Other Memories, and she had Other Memories of my visions."</p><p>Irulan didn't even know what to make of that, so she moved to something simpler. "You know I'm already pregnant," she said. It wasn't a question, and she wasn't surprised. She'd never actually told Paul that she was pregnant, but it was no surprise to her that he already knew. It wouldn't shock her if he'd known she was pregnant before <em>she </em>knew.</p><p>"Yes," he said. "You're pregnant. It'll be a boy."</p><p>She didn't question how he knew that either, even though she hadn't used her Bene Gesserit skills to make sure she had a boy and instead had decided to let fate give her a child that she would love and nurture regardless of gender. There were more pressing questions to address. "Did you ever put contraceptives in my food and drink?"</p><p>"I didn't," he said. "Though I was not intending to breed with you, at least not consciously, until after the day you serviced me on the Golden Lion Throne. After that I knew that you were going to get pregnant when we had sex on our way to Sietch Ashar. I'd seen in my oracular vision that I could have a happy life with you as my wife, and with Chani too in my life as my concubine. So I decided to embrace that future."</p><p>Irulan was still curious about that, but Chani spoke up next with important questions of her own. "Irulan told me that she had been putting contraceptives in my food and drink before what happened on Seprek," the Fremen said. "Apparently you knew and did nothing to stop her."</p><p>"That's correct," Paul said. "I knew. I'd always known. And I never stopped her."</p><p>"Why?" Chani asked. Irulan could hear her pain in that one word, and her heart went out to her friend and lover. Whatever futures Paul might have seen, she wondered if there was any future with Chani as his lover if he did not offer a satisfactory reason as to why he hadn't stopped Irulan from slipping her contraceptives and keeping her from getting pregnant.</p><p>Paul was silent for a few moments and seemed reluctant to answer, but maybe he sensed that Chani needed to hear the truth. He sighed, put his empty cup down and leaned forward in his chair. "Because no matter how hard I looked or how many futures I saw, any future I saw that included you getting pregnant ended with you dying in childbirth."</p><p>Irulan gasped in shock at that, and even though Chani didn’t audibly react a glance over at her told Irulan that she was similarly stunned by what he’d just said. It did make sense, now that Irulan thought of it. He would have had to have a strong reason for allowing her to get away with preventing Chani from getting pregnant for as long as she did, and fear of losing his lover in childbirth was a strong a reason as she could think of. And in his case it would have been far more than a simple blind fear.</p><p>Irulan could see that Chani wasn’t capable of speaking right now, so she took it upon herself to fill the silence. “So you’re saying that you allowed me to feed her those contraceptives for years because you feared what the future would be if you didn’t?”</p><p>“That’s one way to put it,” Paul said. “Another way would be to say that in planting those contraceptives in Chani’s food you were inadvertently prolonging her life.”</p><p>“Can you be sure of that?” Chani asked. She still seemed shaken by what she’d learned, but she’d summoned her courage now. “You’re telling me that I’ll definitely die if I ever give birth to a child again?”</p><p>“How can I say this in terms that might be more easily understood?” Paul frowned and stared off into the distance, and Irulan could practically see his mind working. “Once the flow of time arrives at a certain set of possible futures, certain outcomes become inevitable. The circumstances as to how you reach them may change slightly depending on what choices you make, and they may arrive at a different time as your choices change the flow of events.</p><p>“But one way or another, they will happen no matter how hard you try. You could use Suzuha’s time machine and return to a specific point in time over and over again, making different choices to try and avert that which you know is coming, but you would fail every time. The Jihad is one such example. No matter how many different potential futures there were, it was always going to happen. And your death in childbirth was another such example. No matter how many futures could be glimpsed, every one of them that included your pregnancy ended in your death.”</p><p>“So I can either remain childless, or I can die,” Chani stated. Irulan winced and placed her hand over her belly in sympathy. She knew how dearly she’d wished to be a mother, and how excited she was to make that a reality and give birth to the new life now growing inside of her. That Chani would seemingly be forever denied this was cruel and unfair after she’d fought so hard to save the one she loved. Paul looked at Chani now, and Irulan was surprised to see him smile. Was it a smile of pity, or of comfort, or something else?</p><p>“Things have not turned out as I had foreseen,” he said, and Chani huffed at him seemingly avoiding the direct answer. “According to Chalice, the timeline changed after the massacre on Seprek. That was not supposed to happen, and when it did it caused a chain of events that were also not supposed to transpire. My visions have confirmed that the potential paths forward into the future have shifted radically, for all of us, and we now face a different timeline entirely. With it come a different set of possible futures.”</p><p>“And have any of them changed Chani’s situation?” Irulan asked quickly. Chani had her one good eye closed, apparently struggling to deal with her emotions right now.</p><p>“Previously, all of the timelines I’d looked at involved Chani eventually dying before her time,” Paul said. He got up out of his chair and walked towards them. “But I had never actually spent any time considering futures in which you, Irulan, were romantically involved with us.” He stopped in front of Chani, kneeled down in front of her and took one of her hands and clasped it between both of his. “I didn’t do that until after I first started speaking with Chalice, but when I did I found possible futures in which you had a child without dying.”</p><p>Chani opened her eye at last, and she stared at Paul like she couldn’t dare to hope. Irulan dearly hoped that Paul knew what he was doing, because if he’d said all of this only to dash her hopes once and for all in the end it might be enough to shatter even someone as mentally tough as Chani.</p><p>“You’re two weeks pregnant, Sihaya,” Paul said. Chani’s face went wide with shock, but after a few seconds it changed to pure joy. Irulan smiled as she watched Chani throw her arms around Paul’s neck and hug him tight. She was content to sit in silence and allow Chani to experience this moment of bliss, this thing that she had wanted so badly for so long and was now finally going to have. Irulan still had one more question for her husband, but it could wait until after this moment had passed. She sat back patiently and watched as Paul hugged the woman who had been at his side since he’d been a fugitive hiding in the desert with the Fremen to avoid the eyes of House Corrino.</p><p>Eventually Chani did pull back and take a deep breath, and when Irulan’s eyes met her husband’s she decided to ask her own question. “Paul, you say you’ve been in contact with our future daughter, Chalice.”</p><p>“I have,” he said, nodding.</p><p>“Why did she contact you in the first place?” Irulan asked. “Was it to convince you to have children with me?”</p><p>Paul shook his head. “No. That was what I thought at first as well, but she quickly pointed out that if I hadn’t already been seriously considering doing so we wouldn’t have been able to speak in the first place. No, she spoke to me about something with far greater consequences. She spoke to me about the Golden Path.”</p><p>“The Golden Path?” Irulan said, shaking her head. She turned her head and saw that Chani looked just as confused as she felt, so this obviously wasn’t something he’d talked with her about either. “What’s that?”     </p><p>“I’ve told you before that humanity is on the road to extinction,” Paul said. Chani looked stunned at that, and Irulan recalled Paul telling her that this was something he hadn’t told to anyone, not even Chani. “It can be saved, but only with considerable suffering over thousands of years.”</p><p>“And this is your responsibility?” Irulan said, frowning. “Our unborn daughter came to you because it’s up to you to either set humanity on a path that involves thousands of years of suffering or doom it to go extinct altogether?” If it had come from anyone else Irulan could have dismissed it as delusional nonsense, but she knew better from Paul.</p><p>“Initially I had hoped someone else could take on the mantle, or the burden I suppose,” Paul said. “But the shift of the timeline means that it is now my responsibility, yes. It will require suffering on my part, and on all of humanity, but I must do it. I hope it will be many years before I will have to start building the Golden Path, but it is inevitable. However much I fear it, I have no choice, unless I was to shirk my duty and doom all of humanity.”</p><p>“I don’t really understand all of this,” Chani said. “But whatever this Golden Path is and whatever demands it makes of you, you know that I will be there to support you however I can. I’ll always be here to help you, Usul.”</p><p>“And so will I,” Irulan added. “I don’t know what it is that you’ve seen, or what it is that you’re going to have to do. But I do know that if you don’t have the strength to do what must be done, no one does. I’ll be with you, whatever happens.”</p><p>Paul smiled at them both. “Thank you,” he said. “Thank you both. That means more than you know. I feared that I would not have the strength to see the Golden Path through, but I believe that with your support I will find a way. I love you.” He gave Chani a kiss, and his lover sighed into his mouth and stroked his cheek. Then he turned to Irulan. “I love you too.”</p><p>Irulan smiled and leaned into him, turning her face up and allowing him to kiss her. There had been so much strife and so much uncertainty along the way, but there was no doubt about where she stood in Paul’s life now. She was his wife in the truest sense of the word. She had his affection and she had his heart, just as Chani did, and she would have a child with him. Make that multiple children, since it seemed they were going to have a boy first and then a daughter who she would name Chalice in honor of her deceased sister.</p><p>When Paul’s lips left hers they were quickly met by Chani’s once again, and Irulan waited not so patiently for her turn to kiss him again. After a few turns of that Chani wound up putting her hands on Irulan’s cheeks and kissing her instead. Irulan was excited to kiss her lover again, and hearing Paul groan in response only added to the thrill. Apparently he quite liked seeing his two lovers kissing each other. Hearing his excitement gave Irulan quite a wicked idea, but before she could implement it she was kissed by both Chani <em>and </em>Paul.</p><p>Oh well; her idea would just have to wait for a minute or two. Sharing a three way kiss with the two people she loved was worth a slight delay.</p><p>--</p><p>Chani smirked when Irulan pulled away from the kiss and whispered into her ear, and she allowed the blonde to take her by the hand and lead her over towards the bed in Paul’s chambers. Paul naturally got up and followed them, but Irulan only let him get so far before she wagged one of the fingers of her free hand at him.</p><p>“Stop right there, husband,” she said. Paul looked surprised, but he did stop walking.</p><p>“I’m not welcome in my own bed, in my own chambers?” he asked, watching on with bemusement as Irulan led Chani to sit down on the bed.</p><p>“You’ll be welcome,” Irulan said. “Eventually. But first you’re going to be punished.”</p><p>“Punished?” Paul said, cocking his head.</p><p>“Punished,” Chani repeated with a firm nod of her head. This had been Irulan’s suggestion but she was more than happy to play along with it. “You knocked both of us up without even telling us about it. That deserves a punishment, don’t you think?” She could have said he was being punished for going off on some crazy plan without telling them, but considering the very real and tragic events that had transpired at Castle Caladan that didn’t feel like a good thing to bring up here and now. They’d had their serious discussions for the night already. Now it was time to play, and to celebrate their survival as well as the love they felt for each other.</p><p>“And how am I going to be punished?” he asked.</p><p>“I’m so glad you asked!” Irulan said. “As your punishment, you get to stand there and watch your two lovers have fun with each other until we decide you can join us. I trust you don’t have a problem with that?”</p><p>“What would you do if I said I did?” he wanted to know. Chani was pretty sure he was only asking rhetorically, because the little half-smile on his face suggested that he was going to play along.</p><p>“We would go back to my chambers and spend the rest of the night having fun, just the two of us,” Chani said. “You can either stand there and wait until we invite you, or you can sit here alone for the rest of the night while I help myself to your wife.”</p><p>“It’s your choice, husband,” Irulan said. “I was looking forward to sleeping with you again, but I’d have no problem with spending the entire night showing your beautiful lover just how much I appreciate her.”</p><p>“I suppose I’ll just stand here and endure my punishment then,” Paul said, nodding seriously. Chani doubted it would be much of a punishment for him at all to watch them play with each other; she’d heard how he’d groaned when she and Irulan kissed. But maybe they could make it feel like a bit more of one before the end. With enough teasing he might actually start to feel excluded and ignored, and desperate to be allowed to join in.</p><p>Irulan pulled her into a kiss, and Chani groaned into her mouth. She didn’t think Irulan had kissed her this aggressively since that initial night, where their stress and frustration had exploded in a most spectacular fashion and led to them exploring their passion for each other. She wondered how much of this kiss now was to put on a show and taunt Paul as he was forced to watch, and how much of it was her simply giving in to her genuine passion. This was the first real chance they’d had to do anything like this since everything that happened at Castle Caladan, and Usul was not the only person Chani was relieved to be able to share a bed with again. It made sense that Irulan would be just as thankful, and just as enthusiastic about showing her how she felt.</p><p>Chani barely even noticed as Irulan lowered her down onto her back on the bed and began to remove her clothing. She was far more interested in disrobing the beautiful blonde, and she delighted in the feel of her soft skin beneath her hands as she pulled down the dress that Irulan had worn to the ceremony. She caught a glimpse of Paul staring at them intently, and so Chani drew the moment out a bit. She pulled Irulan’s dress off of her slowly, and she took her time in pulling her underwear down off of her arse and sliding it off entirely.</p><p>She could only keep that tease up for so long though, because lying on top of her was the sexiest woman Chani had ever seen. She’d never really found herself sexually attracted to women until recently, but it seemed almost impossible for anyone to not be attracted to Irulan on some level. She ran her hands down the other woman’s back until she reached her bare arse. And what an arse it was! Irulan’s body was perfect, and her bottom was full, round and a delight to touch and squeeze. Chani’s fingers dug into the lovely flesh, squeezing it, claiming it and marking it as hers. And it <em>was </em>hers, without question. Paul was Irulan’s husband, obviously, but Chani knew that she had just as much claim to this perfect body as Usul did.</p><p>While Chani could have groped Irulan’s rear for the rest of the night and been perfectly happy, there was so much more of her to explore. She rolled them over, flipping their positions so now it was Chani on top and Irulan beneath her. Irulan grunted in surprise at the move, but she smiled up at Chani.</p><p>“This isn’t a position I mind at all,” Irulan said. “You can climb on top of me any time, Chani.”</p><p>“I intend to,” Chani promised. She’d been happy to play with her arse while on bottom, but now that she was on top she moved her focus to her lover’s chest. Irulan’s breasts were as perfect as the rest of her. There was a time that Chani had envied Irulan’s body. Back when she’d considered Irulan to be competition for Paul’s attention and affection, it had been hard not to look at her flawless form and worry that she might be able to tempt her Usul away. But there was no need to worry about that now, and there wasn’t any reason to envy Irulan’s body. It was a body that Chani herself was free to admire and touch, and she would do so every time she was given a chance. She took Irulan’s breasts into her hands and squeezed them, marveling once more at how soft they were.</p><p>“Isn’t she perfect, Usul?” Chani said without looking back. She didn’t need to look back at him to know that Paul was watching, just like she didn’t need to hear him speak to know that he agreed with her. “I have to thank you for bringing her into my life like this. While you’re busy doing the things that the emperor must do, I’ll be able to pass my time far more pleasantly.”</p><p>Irulan giggled. “You’re not the only one. I’m just as lucky to be able to have someone as sexy as you warming my bed.” She took Chani’s rear into her hands and gave it a squeeze. Chani groaned happily but rolled her eyes all the same. She had no particular problem with her ass, but she wasn’t naïve enough to think that touching it and playing with it would be anywhere close to as enjoyable as playing with Irulan’s.</p><p>“Whatever you say, princess,” Chani teased. “We both know who the sexiest one in this bed is.”</p><p>“Do we?” Irulan challenged. She squeezed her arse harder. “Everything about you is sexy, Chani. Even that patch over your eye.”</p><p>Chani snorted in surprise and amusement. Of all the things that Irulan could have praised, she chose her <em>eye patch</em>? “Oh really?”</p><p>“Really,” Irulan said, nodding up at her seriously. “Seeing you staring down at me with that look on your face, and with that patch over your eye, makes you look even stronger and even sexier than before. You look like you could throw me down and do whatever you wanted to me.”</p><p>The way her voice trembled suggested that Irulan would very much like it if Chani did exactly that. If that’s what she wanted, she wouldn’t be disappointed.</p><p>“I guess I have some large expectations to live up to then, don’t I?” Chani whispered. Then she kissed Irulan’s neck, and her lips started to work their way down the flawless body of Paul’s wife and Chani’s lover. There was a little gasp when her lips touched Irulan’s collar bone, so Chani moved on quickly. She kissed her way past Irulan’s belly, and the blonde parted her legs wide as Chani moved lower and brought her head between her legs. She kissed along Irulan’s inner thigh, working her way towards her true goal.</p><p>It wasn’t just Paul who was getting teased now, but also Irulan. Chani could hear her panting with need as she kissed so close to but not quite where her lover really wanted to feel her lips. Irulan probably wasn’t far away from begging at this point, but Chani decided to give her what she wanted before they got there. It was Usul who was supposed to be getting teased right now, not Irulan. Her duty right now was to give Irulan all the affection and all the pleasure she could ever ask for.</p><p>Irulan had all but dared her to do whatever she wanted to her, and this was what Chani wanted to do. The groan of pleasure that Irulan let out when Chani’s lips finally kissed her pussy was lovely. Chani wanted to hear that nearly as much as Irulan wanted to feel her, and they were both getting what they wanted now.</p><p>This wasn’t the first time Chani had done this for Irulan, and while it was likely that Usul had done it even more and might be able to give her advice on a more precise way to bring Irulan pleasure, Chani wasn’t interested in it. She wanted to find her own way, and she wanted the pleasure she gave Irulan with her mouth and her fingers to be her doing and her doing alone. She wriggled her tongue around inside of Irulan’s pussy, and her fingers paid attention to her clit. That was something she’d discovered had worked well for Irulan, and she went back to it now.</p><p>She was rewarded for her attention to detail by the same loud, pleasured moans that she had quickly come to treasure from Irulan. Teasing Paul with an erotic show he was not welcome to join yet was no longer what Chani cared about. It was all about using her tongue and her fingers to make sure that Irulan kept making those noises.</p><p>Irulan’s fingers fisted in Chani’s hair and her moans got louder, and Chani knew by now that this meant she was getting closer to the ultimate pleasure. Chani did the only thing she could do, which was keep giving her everything that she could. She wiggled her tongue around as vigorously as she could manage and her fingers continued to dance across her clit, and after a few more moments they both got what they wanted. Irulan got to experience the highest of sexual highs, and Chani got to listen to her orgasmic cries and know that she was responsible for them all. It was as wonderful an exchange as you could ask for.</p><p>“That was incredible,” Irulan whispered once her cries died down and her body relaxed. Chani grinned up at her from between her legs.</p><p>“Yes it was,” she agreed. She left a farewell kiss between Irulan’s legs before pulling back. “Don’t you agree, Usul?”</p><p>She looked back over her shoulder at her lover, and smiled at the state she found him in. Irulan’s idea had certainly worked; she didn’t think she’d ever seen a look of such desperation on that face which she had studied so closely for years now. The goal had been to tease him and make him eager to join in while he watched them, and they had succeeded there.</p><p>“Yes,” he said, and to her delight his voice cracked slightly. He’d never seen his two lovers together so intimately, and it had struck him dumb.</p><p>“You look like you want to join in badly,” Chani said. Paul didn’t even speak now; he just nodded quickly. She looked down at her beautiful blonde lover, naked and sated on the bed. “What do you think, Irulan? Should we let him join us now?”</p><p>Irulan sat up on the bed and stared at Paul. “Hmm. Let me think about it.” She tapped her chin thoughtfully, then stretched her arms high above her head. Chani’s eye was drawn straight to her breasts, and she grinned as she heard Usul moan. Irulan knew exactly what she was doing in stretching her body and sticking her breasts out, and Paul was just as captivated by the tease as Chani was. The key difference was that Chani didn’t have to stare longingly. She could touch all she liked, and she did just that. She grabbed Irulan’s breasts again and gave them a firm, loving squeeze. Irulan gasped and smiled at her, and Paul let out a helpless groan.</p><p>Irulan giggled at the sound, and after letting Chani continue to grope her for a few more moments she looked beyond her to where her desperate husband stood. “I think he’s suffered long enough,” she said. “I’m okay with him joining us now. As long as <em>you’re </em>okay with it, Chani.”</p><p>Chani let go of Irulan’s breasts at last to turn and face Paul fully. She already knew what she was going to say, but she still stared at him silently for a few seconds, letting the moment drag out to prolong his teasing just a little bit more. He stared at her intently, hanging on her decision, and she swore she could see the anxiety and tension release from him when she finally nodded.</p><p>“Come to bed, Usul,” she said. He was already beginning to strip before she’d even finished her sentence.</p><p>--</p><p>Paul had been equal parts frustrated and aroused as he was forced to stand and watch his wife and his concubine together. Watching Chani put her head between Irulan’s legs and lick her, seeing how genuinely eager she was to do it, and hearing the princess moan in pleasure had left him uncomfortably hard inside of his trousers.</p><p>It had all been worth the wait though. Every bit of teasing was being rewarded now, and he knew he would have gladly subjected himself to hours more of it if this was what waited for him at the end.</p><p>Both Irulan and Chani had sucked his cock plenty of times, and they were both very good at it. Chani had had years to learn how to suck him as they discovered so much about sex together over the years, and Irulan had been trained in this by the Bene Gesserit, and just as in most things their education had not been wasted. He’d already felt fortunate to have either one of them sucking his cock. But now, for the first time ever, he got to experience both of their mouths on him at the same time.</p><p>At first they’d basically mirrored each others’ movements. One would run her tongue up and down one side of his cock while the other mimicked her on the opposite side, and then they would come together and take turns licking at the cockhead. As great as that had felt, the pleasure had only mounted for him once they spent a little more time licking him and settled into more of a routine.</p><p>All three of them had eventually discovered that it was best for them to focus on different things, and that’s what they were doing now. Irulan had his cock between her lips and was bobbing her head up and down on him, and Chani was sucking on his balls. Either one of these things would have felt great on its own, but with both of them happening at the same time it was a wonder he hadn’t already spilled his seed down his wife’s throat. She probably wouldn’t have minded, but Paul wanted to hold on to this for as long as he possibly could. For as long as his body allowed him to, he wanted to continue to enjoy the unimaginably wonderful feeling of the two women he loved worshipping his cock with their mouths at the same time.</p><p>He groaned as Irulan pulled her mouth off of him with a pop. She smiled up at him while wrapping her hand around his shaft and stroking slowly.</p><p>“Are you close?” she asked while continuing to pump him.</p><p>“I can hold on for a little bit longer,” he said. How long, he couldn’t say. But he would try his hardest to hang in there.</p><p>“Want to make a game of it, Chani?” Irulan suggested. “We can take turns sucking him until he cums, and whoever finishes him off gets the first fuck.”</p><p>Chani had kept right on sucking on Paul’s balls while Irulan checked on him, but she pulled away now. “You’re on,” she said. And then, before Irulan could say anything else, Chani darted forward and took the tip of his cock into her mouth.</p><p>“I see someone doesn’t want to play fair,” Irulan grumbled, but Paul could see her smirk.</p><p>He didn’t get to focus on Irulan for long though, because Chani commanded his attention with her quick and eager bobs. She showed that she had every intention of winning by throwing her all into the blowjob, working her head down as fast as she could. When Chani was trying to get him off she generally put priority on speed, and he couldn’t say it didn’t work.</p><p>Irulan took a different approach once it was her turn to give it a try. She focused more on using her tongue, and she lingered more around the tip of his cock as opposed to bobbing and taking all of his length down like Chani did. If Chani was all about speed and force, Irulan was going for superior technique.</p><p>Paul wasn’t sure how he lasted for as long as he did. The two women swapped places several times, and somehow he was able to hold out. Going back and forth between the two differing but effective philosophies was a unique challenge for him, but he grabbed the bed sheets beneath him in a white-knuckled grip and rode this out through several rotations, driving the playful competitiveness between the two women into a higher level.</p><p>Chani’s aggression and Irulan’s technique both drove him wild, and either one of them would have gotten him off sooner or later if allowed to keep him for herself. It was pure coincidence that it happened to be Chani’s lips around his cock when he finally lost his battle, but she was the victor regardless.</p><p>It was Paul who really felt like a winner though as his body trembled and his hands went to his lover’s long red hair to instinctively keep her in place. She wouldn’t have gone anywhere though. Chani kept her lips sealed around his cock and swallowed his cum as fast as he could pump it into her mouth. She pulled back when she was done, licked her lips and opened her mouth to show Paul that she had swallowed all of it. Then she turned to smile at Irulan.</p><p>“I win.”</p><p>--</p><p>Chani was well aware that it could just as easily have been Irulan who finished Paul off, swallowed his cum and won the right to go first. She knew that it had really been a combination of their work that had made Paul cum; it was a true team effort. That didn’t mean she wasn’t going to take full advantage of the deal they’d agreed to.</p><p>It was Chani in charge now, and she was in charge in every way imaginable. She kept Paul down on his back on the bed and straddled his body, and after some time to recover and a little bit of wriggling on her part, he was ready for more. She reached behind her to take his cock into her hand, and she grinned down at him. This would be their first time together since before he went off to Castle Caladan and nearly got himself killed, and she was happy to finally be on the verge of fucking the only man she’d ever loved once again.</p><p>One of Paul’s hands rose up to cup her face and stroke her cheek. His thumb brushed her skin just to the left of her eye patch, and she smiled and held it there for a moment. She’d never expected him to reject her because of her injury, but it still soothed her soul to feel him touch her like that without any hesitation or any sign that he didn’t find her every bit as attractive as he had before her eye had been taken from her.</p><p>But as nice as the moment was, Chani wasn’t all that interested in continuing on with tenderness right now. She loved Usul and was perfectly happy with exploring the softer side of that, but not at this moment. After days apart, and after all of the anxiety, pain and loss she’d experienced in the time since, what she wanted now was a hard, fast and aggressive fuck to remind herself that she was alive, that he was alive and they were here, together.</p><p>Now that he was hard again she could get on with it and take what she wanted, and that’s what Chani did. She raised her hips off of him while holding his cock steady, and then she sank down onto him. She groaned at the familiar pleasure of her Usul’s cock penetrating her, but she didn’t stop to enjoy it. She wanted it all, and she was going to take it.</p><p>She put her hands on her lover’s chest and rode him aggressively, dropping her hips down onto him and raising herself back up quickly to do it again just as hard. She went at it roughly right from the start and only built her ride up into something stronger the more she went on. Chani wasn’t concerned with expressing her love with sweet whispers or tender kisses; not this time. She was showing her lover how much she had missed him by driving her body down onto his cock with all of the strength that she could manage.</p><p>Paul loved it, as she knew he would. His hands rested on her hips and he smiled up at her as he allowed her to take him at her chosen pace. He wasn’t a commanding emperor right now; he was just a man who had survived his near-death experience and was as happy to be underneath his lover as she was to be on top of him. He was hers as surely as she was his, and he had no problem with allowing her to bounce on his cock with all her might. He was strong, but she was strong too. She was Fremen.</p><p>No matter how many times Chani had done this, there was still that same wonderful feeling that shot through her body every time she had his cock inside of her. His cock was large and filled her up well of course, but that was only part of it. Even if she’d been mounted on top of a cock every bit as long and thick as this one, the pleasure would not have been nearly as great as it was if that cock belonged to anyone but her Usul. She could look down and watch his face as she rode him, and see the pleasure written across the face of the only man she had ever been with or would ever be with.</p><p>His hands went from her hips up to her breasts, and he gave them a slight squeeze. He could make her feel quite good with his hands there when he was in the mood to do so, particularly when he used his fingers on her nipples, but that wasn’t what he did now. There was no skill and no attempt to stimulate her. He was simply grabbing them to have something to hold onto, and wasn’t in a state of mind to do anything else.</p><p>Years of both making love and fucking with her Usul told Chani what that meant. He was nearly there; he was on the verge of reaching orgasm. The mindless squeeze meant that he was trying to hold it off for as long as he could, maybe because he felt it hadn’t been long enough and he was afraid of disappointing her. But there was nothing to worry about there. This was exactly what she wanted. She’d climbed on top of him and bounced on his cock like this because she wanted to connect with him again, and she didn’t need it to last long. It was passion and release that she sought, not endurance.</p><p>“Let go,” she said, covering his hands with hers. He shook his head stubbornly, but she nodded. She moved her body even harder on his, making the bed creak as she physically demanded that he stop withholding this from her. “Let go,” she said again, insisting with her words just as strongly as she did with her body. “Cum, Usul. Cum inside of me.”   </p><p>He could deny her no longer. He groaned and his hands squeezed around her breasts harder as he gave up the fight and gave Chani what she demanded. His cum shot into her, and as happy as Chani had been to swallow it earlier when she won the friendly battle with Irulan, this was where she truly wanted him to finish. For so many years now she’d taken his cum inside of her with hopes that it would result in her finally giving him a child. For years she’d been denied, though she didn’t know why. She’d just thought that she had let him down, and that their poor little murdered Leto would be the only child they would ever have together.</p><p>It wasn’t the case anymore. She’d since learned why she’d failed, and even though she now knew it hadn’t been her fault that she’d failed to get pregnant for so long that hadn’t done anything to replace the feeling of loss. But now, at last, her wait and her frustration was over. Usul had told her she was pregnant, and he would never lie to her about that. She was going to be a mother.</p><p>In that sense it wasn’t as vital for him to finish inside of her, but she knew it would always be where she preferred it. There was a closeness to it that couldn’t be matched, and somehow knowing that his seed had already done its work and there was no technical need for him to cum inside of her anymore only made the pleasure that much greater for Chani. Feeling Paul finish, and knowing that she was soon going to give him the child she’d dreamed of for years, offered enough satisfaction on top of the pure physical pleasure her ride had given her to help her finish along with him.</p><p>Chani screamed in joy as she came on her lover’s cock, and she forced her eye to stay open so she could look straight at him as they shared this moment. He smiled up at her and again stroked her face with his hand while she screamed and moaned her way through her orgasm.</p><p>Her body stopped its ride, having completed its purpose, and yet she stayed seated on him and kept him inside of her. She didn’t often feel any great hurry to get him out of her after they were finished, and she felt even less urgency now considering all that they’d been through and all that she’d learned.</p><p>It was Irulan’s touch that snapped her out of it. It was not a demanding touch by any means; Irulan was simply running her hand up and down Chani’s skin slowly. It was meant to comfort, and when Chani looked at her lover she saw a gentle smile on Irulan’s face. She wasn’t going to force Chani to relinquish her spot on Paul’s cock, despite no doubt being just as eager for her turn as Chani had been. She was being selfless and letting Chani have her moment, and that was enough for Chani to decide to be selfless in return.</p><p>She pulled off of Paul’s cock slowly, sat down beside him and gave Irulan’s arm a squeeze.</p><p>“Your turn.”</p><p>--</p><p>Irulan had watched Chani take Paul for a ride, and it had been an enjoyable thing to be able to witness from so close. Her thoughts on how strong and sexy Chani looked with her eye patch had only been validated by watching her ride Paul's cock so confidently, and even with the speed and intensity of it, the love they felt for each other had been obvious in every touch and every glance they shared. Irulan had been honored to be able to watch these two longtime lovers together in an unguarded moment.</p><p>She had no desire to follow in their footsteps though; not today at least. Chani had chosen to make her first time with Paul since the attack one where she got on top and fucked away everything that had happened, but Irulan was in the mood for something different. Through her own choice she was flat on her back while Paul slowly rocked his hips and pushed his cock back and forth inside of her. It was slow, it was deliberate and it was passionate. and it was exactly what she wanted.</p><p>She'd asked him to make love to her, and Paul was taking her up on it and giving her precisely what she asked him for. His hips would push into her slowly, letting her feel his big cock enter her every step of the way until he was all the way inside of her, which was no mean feat with how large he was. Sometimes he would promptly begin the slow yet wonderful return trip, during which his cock would brush against her all over again and make her sigh. Sometimes he would stay fully inside of her for a bit, and he would kiss her neck or lick at a nipple before moving to pull back.</p><p>Irulan loved it all. As much as she loved having him give it to her hard when the situation called for it, this gradual, unhurried lovemaking was what she needed from him right now. She wanted to feel close to him, after the battle at Castle Caladan and their argument and estrangement before that. She wanted to feel close to him; she wanted to feel connected to her husband and the father of her unborn child. Or make that children, she supposed, since she was pregnant with their son and he apparently had already had several conversations with the daughter that would follow.</p><p>And she did feel close to him. She didn't think she'd ever felt closer, or felt like she belonged with him more than she did right now. There was no one reason behind that. It was a combination of everything, from the gentle look in his eyes, the reality of the family they were going to build, the incident they'd survived that had brought them even closer, and even Chani getting down on her side right next to her and holding Irulan's hand while Paul made love to her.</p><p>It was ironic how much things had changed between all three of them, but Irulan was thrilled about all of the changes. She was happy that Chani had accepted it so easily when Paul broke his old promise to her and began sleeping with his wife, and she was happy they'd both reached a point where there was no jealousy. Irulan had been able to watch Chani ride Paul without feeling threatened in any way, and Chani definitely didn't seem to be at all upset about watching the man she'd loved for so long making love to her.</p><p>That they themselves had formed their own unique relationship surely had something to do with the lack of true competitiveness they felt about Paul. What reason was there to fear that the other woman would supplant them when they had feelings for each other that were all their own, independent of what they had with Paul? Irulan pulled Chani's head down so she could share a soft kiss with her while Paul made love to her, and Chani sighed against her lips and kissed her back. From being all alone to sharing a bed with two people she cared about and would be starting a family with, things really had changed drastically for Irulan since that massacre on Seprek that had allegedly changed the entire future of the universe. If Irulan's new circumstances were part of that change, she could only welcome the shift.</p><p>Chani gave her another kiss before scooting back slightly on her knees, allowing Paul and Irulan to have this moment all to themselves. Irulan gave her another smile, and made an internal promise to repay her favor from earlier and use her mouth on her as soon as she had the opportunity. Then she put all of her attention on her husband once again. She held her arms out to Paul, and he leaned down over her body and kissed her. She moaned and wrapped her arms around his neck, squeezing him with her arms while he kept his cock fully sheathed inside of her.</p><p>"I love you," she whispered as he pulled back. And she did. Not so long ago those were words she'd never expected to say to her husband, much less to actually mean them, but she meant it with all her heart now. Whatever their relationship had been in the past, this was the reality between them now. He was her husband in the truest sense of the word, he was going to be the father of her children, and he was the man that she loved. And now she was ready for a bit more from him. As wonderful as this had been thus far, Irulan was ready to feel more from him.</p><p>"You can move a little bit harder, Paul," she said in between moans as he nuzzled her neck and gently squeezed her breasts. "We wouldn't want to make Chani wait all night for her chance to do more, would we?"</p><p>"Take all the time you want," Chani chuckled even as Paul listened to Irulan and started to move a bit faster. "I'm happy to sit here and watch for now. Watching is giving me all kinds of inspiration for the future. Though I honestly don't know who I envy more right now."</p><p>"If you're smart, it's me," Paul said as he pulled his hips back and gave another thrust into Irulan. It was still nowhere close to what he was capable of or what they had done in the past. Sex between them had so often been rough, intense and demanding, and she knew it would often be like that in the future as well. She'd come to appreciate the way her body felt when he fucked her like that. But this was perfect right now. He was moving with a bit more force than before, but she was still able to touch him and kiss him without needing to worry about her body being pushed to its limits.</p><p>That wasn't to say there wasn't plenty of physical pleasure to go along with this though. He didn't need to fuck her hard to make her feel it; this steady pace was more than quick enough for Irulan to feel her pleasure building, especially since every thrust of his hips seemed designed to make sure that his cock moved inside of her at the best angle possible.</p><p>He also continued to give her more sensations to enjoy aside from just his cock moving in and out. His mouth lightly nipped at her neck when they weren't sharing a passionate kiss on the lips, and his hands were busy at her chest. Many times in the past he had squeezed her breasts hard while fucking her, but right now he was as concerned with her pleasure as he was with his own, if not even more so. He squeezed her breasts a bit, but focused more on her nipples. His fingers rubbed them gently, playing with her sensitive nipples and adding that pleasant sensation to go along with the simple excitement that came from that big cock moving inside of her so well. Irulan moaned into his mouth and gently squeezed his buttocks while he thrust into her.</p><p>This was not the frantic fuck they'd exchanged so often, and even with the accelerated pace compared to earlier it still wasn't over anywhere near as quickly as the ride Chani had taken on Paul's cock. They took their time in exploring each other, touching each other and loving each other, and to her credit Chani never said a word about how much time they took up. But as long as it might have taken, it still reached its end eventually. Irulan could sense it building up inside of her, and she'd kissed him a little bit harder and squeezed him a little bit more firmly as she fought not to beg him to hurry it along. Now that she was almost there it was so tempting to give in and demand immediate gratification, but she settled for just kissing, touching and moaning as she waited for him to get her off at their current established tempo.</p><p>Then, finally, it arrived. Even though she'd known it was coming for quite some time, her breath still left her lungs in a high-pitched whimper as her body was assaulted by the pleasure. It was the first orgasm Paul had given her since not only before the events of Castle Caladan but also before their argument over the Duncan Idaho ghola, and she was now reminded of just how good it felt when her husband made her cum. As glad as she had been to have Chani's companionship in the interim (and as excited as she would be to continue enjoying it in the future), she was relieved to have this feeling back in her life. She clung to Paul tight and moaned into his ear as she came on his cock.</p><p>He slowed down a bit to let her enjoy her moment, but soon enough she ruffled his hair with her hands and groaned. "Finish, Paul," she whispered. "Finish."</p><p>Paul still didn't resort to a wild all-out thrusting, but he did start to move a bit faster on top of her as he got closer to his own end. Irulan held him and smiled up at him, encouraging him to keep going with whispers of "more, more" and "yes." He groaned, and towards the end he couldn't hold himself back any more. His final few thrusts were wild and forceful, and the impact of his body smacking against hers was harder than anything she'd felt all night. Irulan didn't care. She was used to a rougher fuck from him, and her injuries from the battle were healing. She could take it.</p><p>When Paul pushed beyond the edge and began to cum inside of her, Irulan slammed her lips against his hard and kissed him with all of the passion she could muster. Aside from obviously being the first time they'd been together since the fight with the Tleilaxu, this was the first time they'd done this and the first time he'd cum inside of her since she'd learned she was pregnant with her first child. She hoped to express everything that she felt in that moment with this one kiss, and whether she was successful in that or not, he moaned and kissed her back with equal passion while his cock erupted inside of her.</p><p>They continued to kiss after he'd finished cumming, and while he looked like he might have been happy to remain on top of her and keep kissing her for the rest of the night, she gently nudged his ribs until he rolled off of her. Whether they did anything more tonight or not, she needed a bit of a break.</p><p>And he would probably need a break and a chance to recover even more than she did, because she had a feeling Chani would be looking for some more satisfaction of her own soon enough.</p><p>--</p><p>Paul was breathing heavily as he thrust his hips hard against Chani. Irulan was lightly dozing on the other side of the bed, exhausted by the day's activities, but his Fremen lover was still in the mood for more. And after all that had happened recently, not to mention the trials he knew still lay ahead, he did not plan on letting her down any time soon if he could help it.</p><p>Chani was still in the mood for the rougher sort of sex right now, which was why they found themselves in the position they were in. She was on her knees and elbows on the bed, and Paul held onto her slim hips while fucking her arse. Anal sex was something he'd never dreamed of asking her for in all the years they were together, and the first time they'd ever done it had been at her request after she'd heard he'd done it with Irulan and decided she wanted to try it for herself too. Now it had become something she seemed to rather enjoy.</p><p>That was just fine by Paul. Part of the reason he'd first done this with Irulan was he'd never expected to do it to Chani. He'd used Irulan to satisfy some of the rougher sexual urges he'd had that he'd refrained from loosing on Chani. Now, just as Irulan received tenderness in addition to the rougher things he'd done with her exclusively at first, Chani took a forceful anal fuck as readily and willingly as she took anything else.</p><p>Anal sex with Chani was wholly different than anal sex with Irulan, largely because their body types were so different. Chani did not have the full, prominent rear that jiggled and shook so wildly as his hips smacked against it like Irulan did. But buggering her was still something he would do any time she asked for it with a smile on his face. He held onto her hips and kept driving his cock into her arse while his wife slept nearby. He didn't know how Irulan could continue to sleep with the sound of his flesh smacking against Chani's, not to mention how loudly she moaned, but he supposed that was just a sign of how tired she really was.</p><p>Paul kept using his lover, and he reached between her legs and rubbed at her clit with his fingers to make sure that she came right along with him. Her head dropped down and she bit the pillow as she came, which was probably the only thing that kept Irulan from waking up to the sound of an orgasmic scream. Paul bit down on his lip to stifle his own grunt as he pulled out and shot his final load of the night onto Chani's lower back. She flopped down and sprawled out on the bed as soon as he was done, and if she felt the cum on her back she didn't have the energy to wipe at it.</p><p><em>I really should clean that off for her,</em> Paul said to himself as his eyes drifted closed. Quite against his will, he fell asleep in between the two women in his life before he could actually follow through on his idea and clean Chani up.</p><p>--</p><p>When Irulan woke, she found herself sandwiched between her two lovers. Paul's arms were around her, resting just underneath her breasts as he hugged her from behind. His heat against her backside was a welcome presence, especially given all that had happened. It was one more reminder that he was here, they'd made it back, and all was well between them, or at least it would be. They were moving on from their past and building a better future together, a future where they loved each other and had children together, just as she'd hoped might happen when she first married him.</p><p>Chani wasn't consciously embracing her, but she'd snuggled against Irulan in her sleep and thrown a leg over hers. Irulan watched her chest rise and fall for a few seconds, and then admired her face. She wasn't joking or trying to make her feel better when she said she found her eye patch sexy. She'd been attracted to Chani before they went to Castle Caladan, and she found her even more desirable now. She smiled, rested her hand on Chani's leg that was flung over her body, and closed her eyes once again.</p><p>Irulan had not felt this content in years. Despite everything that had happened and all of the issues that still remained ahead for them, she finally had something to hold onto. For years she'd been alone, but now she had two people she loved and who loved her in return. She would soon realize her dream of becoming a mother, and Chani would apparently be doing the same very soon thereafter. Maybe it hadn't happened exactly the way she'd expected it to, but she was about to start a family of her own. She had two lovers and was about to become a mother, and it looked like she was even going to get to see her two youngest sisters regularly as well. She had things worth fighting for, and it was worth facing whatever tried to stand in their way and come between them.</p><p>An open fight with the Tleilaxu was obviously coming, and though she had no clue what was going to happen or the sacrifices that would need to be made to bring about this Golden Path Paul spoke about, she didn't doubt that it was coming. But even if she didn't know exactly what that meant or understand what it would require from Paul, and from all of humanity evidently, she felt ready to face it as long as she had these two with her.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>A/N: Should just be a short epilogue left to go after this.</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MayorHaggarFics</p></blockquote></div></div>
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